Sabres VS Red Wings Game Recap 1/20/17

FINAL OT: BUF 3 DET 2

SHOTS: BUF 37 DET 34

POWERPLAY: BUF 2/4 DET 1/4

HITS: BUF 11 DET 11

BLOCKS: BUF 22 DET 9

GOALS:

DET: Frans Nielson (10) assisted by Mike Green (14)

BUF: Sam Reinhart (10) assisted by Jack Eichel (8) and Rasmus Ristolainen (25)

DET: Darren Helm (5) assisted by Justin Abdelkader (6) and Alexey Marchenko (6)

BUF: Ryan O’Reilly (9) assisted by Cody Franson (9) and Justin Falk (3)

BUF: Kyle Okposo (14) assisted by Ryan O’Reilly (18) and Jack Eichel (9)

RECAP: 

The Buffalo Sabres just coming off of a rough loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs would face another division rival tonight in the Detroit Red Wings who are also having a tough season so far. After missing practice, yesterday due to sickness Anders Nilsson started this game.

Jake McCabe was tripped into the boards by Gustav Nyquist and he injured his shoulder. McCabe did return to the game but he did eventually leave again and he did not return. McCabe was spotted leaving the arena wearing a sling. Dan Bylsma said that the Sabres will not be using an emergency recall on Brendan Guhle. So expect to see either Casey Nelson or Erik Burgdoerfer recalled from Rochester. A major problem here is that with Dmitry Kulikov, Jake McCabe, and Josh Gorges all injured the Sabres only left-handed defenseman is Justin Falk. Both Burgdoerfer and Nelson are right handed.

Halfway through the first period Zach Bogosian took a holding penalty on Detroit winger Tomas Tatar and Frans Nielson converted on the powerplay. That was certainly a goal that Nilsson has to stop.

The Red Wings would hold on to their 1-0 lead until the end of the second period. Jack Eichel put the puck on Petr Mrazek and the rebound would go right to Sam Reinhart who then kicked the puck towards the net and then the puck went off of Danny Dekeyser’s stick and into the net. Sam Reinhart had a terrific game tonight and he showed great chemistry with Jack Eichel. Sam made quite a few amazing passes this game as he usually does.

Darren Helm was able to sneak the puck past Anders Nilsson for his 5th goal of the season. Detroit would take a 2-1 lead with seven minutes left in the game.

But just two minutes later, Ryan O’Reilly took the puck all the way around the net while on his backhand and he roofed it past Petr Mrazek to tie the game at two a piece.

The game would head to overtime. Frans Nielson took a hooking penalty and his former Islanders teammate Kyle Okposo scored his team-leading 14th goal of the season to give the Buffalo Sabres the win over the division rival Red Wings.

With Jake McCabe’s injury, Rasmus Ristolainen logged a career high in minutes. He played over 35 minutes in this game. That is not a typo 35 MINUTES AND 24 SECONDS. Wow just wow. And on top of that, he played in all of the overtime period as well.

The Sabres will face the top team in the Atlantic Division the Montreal Canadiens tomorrow night at 7 p.m.