BUFFALO — They went 14 years without playoff hockey. Then, when it returned, somehow the wait for a single goal likely felt just as long. But when the dam broke and keyed a thunderous Buffalo stampede, it was all worth it for hockey’s longest-suffering fans.
As expected, the city of Buffalo was on tilt as the Sabres hosted the Boston Bruins on Sunday night for a match that marked the first NHL post-season hockey in Western New York since 2011. Before the game, KeyBank Center was surrounded by Sabres supporters fueled by — among other things — the exhilarating knowledge that their team was about to emerge from what seemed like a never-ending winter and finally play hockey in the season it matters most.
Then came a game that felt like air slowly leaking from a tire.
Already put to the test beyond any reasonable expectation, Sabres supporters had to do 52:02 more of hard time before they had something specific to centre all that pent-up emotion on. With his team down 2-0 to a crafty Bruins team backed by Jeremy Swayman’s strong goaltending, Tage Thompson — after two Boston defenders pinned his teammate, Peyton Krebs, against the boards — took a puck that squirted loose behind the net and stuffed it past Swayman before the goalie could get a toe to the post.
Belief blossomed and permeated the building, starting with the 20 guys wearing blue and yellow.
“The energy on the bench, the energy in the building after we got the first one, I just felt, we’re going to get one; we’re going to have a good look to get the next one,” said Sabres coach Lindy Ruff. “Because we were garnering a lot of the offensive-zone play; it was just whether we could break them down and get that good chance.”
When the next opportunity came, it was Thompson finding the net again, sniping his second tally in a span of 3:42. Fifty-two seconds later, defenceman Mattias Samuelsson buried from the slot, then did a celebratory slam into the glass with the same force he used to smack Bruins forwards all night.
“Tommer (Thompson) got us going there and the place just erupted,” Samuelsson said. “You could feel the energy building. As a group we felt, once we cracked them, we could roll from there.”
By the time native son Alex Tuch was heading toward an empty net with no Bruin in between, the pre-game hysteria had not only returned, but elevated to a whole other level, the wildest of emotions validated by a rollicking victory that landed on a 4-3 count after Boston’s David Pastrnak scored with just eight ticks remaining in the third.
What better way to end a drought than with a flood?
“Tonight’s game was full of emotion for everyone, so I’m just happy we could come out on the right side,” Thompson said.
While the comeback required everyone pulling on the rope — not to mention some key saves by Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, including thwarting Pastrnak on a pair of second-period breakaways — there’s no denying Thompson’s skill and determination keyed the comeback. After catching Swayman a touch off guard on his first strike, the six-foot-six Thompson was a tenacious demon on his second, forechecking below the goal line and ultimately beating Boston centre Elias Lindholm to a loose puck at the side of the net, before wiring it past Swayman on the glove side.
It was the kind of play that showed the ferocity Thompson and Sabres captain Rasmus Dahlin are in constant conversation about.
“We always talk about, dogs have to be dogs said and today he showed up and led the team,” Dahlin said. “That was special.”
That was the way it looked from all the way down in the Sabres crease, too.
“I feel like Tage has grown as a leader so much this year and he’s been a really, really big part of our success on the ice, off the ice,” said Luukkonen. “He takes care of everybody. Those big moments, he’s shown it in many levels that he’s built for that. He showed his best tonight.”
Suffice to say, there’s been more than enough anger and disappointment to go around in Buffalo, both inside and outside the dressing room. Thompson, though, has been there as long as anyone, having landed still shy of his 21st birthday in a 2018 trade with the St. Louis Blues. Like 10 other teammates Sunday, Thompson was making his post-season debut and was determined to meet the moment.
“I think eight years of adversity is enough experience to get you ready for something like this,” he said. “Any time you go eight years of not making the playoffs and then it’s finally here, the last thing you want is regret. There’s just a heightened feeling of hunger; you just don’t want to let this opportunity slip. I thought tonight was really important to make a statement and set our standard. We still have another level to get to and we’re going to keep trying every game to find another level.”
Certainly, despite the win, there’s room for improvement. Ruff acknowledged there was some jittery puck play in the early going. And, perhaps more concerningly, a power play that entered the game on an 0-for-22 skid went 0-for-4 and seemed to be less threatening with each successive opportunity.
Even if Buffalo had lost this game, though, it would have been hard to get too bogged down in the negative given the circumstances. But to win it the way the club did, with the same never-say-die attitude it showed all year while storming back to NHL relevance, it only stokes fires of belief and makes it easy to put the focus where it should be on a night like this.
“It was definitely cooler than I expected,” Dahlin said of the atmosphere. “I couldn’t hear anything except the crowd.”
Ruff, the rare person on the Sabres with all kinds of post-season chapters in his book, was just as rosy as the newbies.
“You could feel the building shaking,” the 66-year-old veteran bench boss said with a glow. “The atmosphere was unbelievable. It was great to give our fans (that) third period.”
Thompson said the anticipation for what the Sabres would be skating into was on his mind for several days leading up to Game 1. The people in the stands came through, just like he did on the sheet.
“These are the kind of games you live for,” Thompson said.
And, after that one, Buffalo could not be more alive.
