Game Preview: 1/29/15 at EDM

GAME-DAY RESOURCES

LAST GAME
Tuesday, January 27
Buffalo 1 at Calgary 4
Goals: Stewart
Goalie: Enroth (27 saves/31 shots)
PP: 1/2; PK: 3/4; Shots: Calgary 31 – Buffalo 18

CURRENT INJURIES – (Man Games Lost: 172)
Player (injury, first game missed) – total games missed
Marcus Foligno (undisclosed, Dec. 23; injured reserve) – 14 games
Cody McCormick (lower body, Jan. 13; injured reserve) – 5 games
Michal Neuvirth (lower body, Jan. 27) – 1 game

TRANSACTIONS IN PAST 7 DAYS
1/26: Recalled F Matt Ellis and G Matt Hackett from Rochester (AHL); Activated F Brian Gionta from IR

UPCOMING GAMES
Friday, Jan. 30: Buffalo at Vancouver, 10 p.m.
Tuesday, Feb. 3: Buffalo at Montreal, 7:30 p.m.
Thursday, Feb. 5: St. Louis at Buffalo, 7 p.m.
Saturday, Feb. 7: Dallas at Buffalo, 7 p.m.
Sunday, Feb. 8: NY Islanders at Buffalo, 5 p.m.

TONIGHT’S GAME
SABRES at OILERS

• This is the second of two meetings between the Sabres and Oilers this season.
• Last meeting: Edmonton defeated Buffalo, 3-2, in Buffalo on Nov. 7
• The Sabres are 7-3-0 in their last 10 games vs. the Oilers; 5-4-1 on the road.
• This is the 69th game all-time between Buffalo and Edmonton; Buffalo has a 22-36-10 series record.
• The Sabres are 9-21-3 on the road against the Oilers all-time.

THIS DATE IN SABRES HISTORY

• The Sabres are 7-7-4 all-time on January 29.
• January 29, 1971: Gilbert Perreault scores the first hat trick in franchise history as the Sabres down the Golden Seals, 4-2, in California.
• January 29, 1984: Gilbert Perreault records three points (2+1) in his 1,000th NHL game, a 7-3 win in Buffalo against the Pittsburgh Penguins. Perreault was the 52nd player in NHL history to reach this milestone and is joined by Craig Ramsay as the only two players to play at least 1,000 games with the Sabres.

THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW

• Tonight’s game is the second in a three-game western swing. The team will then visit Montreal before returning home for a five-game homestand.
• Michal Neuvirth sustained a lower-body injury during the All-Star break and is expected to miss the entire western trip.
• Matt Hackett made his Sabres debut in Edmonton last season, stopping 35 of 36 shots in a 3-1 win on March 20, 2014.
• The Sabres have gone 7-2-0 in their last nine games against the Oilers, outscoring them by a 33-17 margin.
• Chris Stewart leads the Sabres with 17 career points (11+6) in 22 games against the Oilers.
• If he appears in tonight’s game, Josh Gorges will become the 58th active defenseman to play 600 NHL games.

IT’S BEEN AWHILE
With a win, the Sabres will have won five straight matchups in Edmonton, with their last road loss to the Oilers coming on Oct. 16, 2003. No players on the teams’ current rosters played in that game. Before the current streak, the Sabres had never won consecutive games in Edmonton.

NICE TO SEE YOU AGAIN
Four Sabres average at least a point per game in their limited experience against the Oilers: Drew Stafford (7 GP, 8+2), Matt Moulson (6 GP, 2+4), Mike Weber (4 GP, 2+2), Zemgus Girgensons (2 GP, 0+2). Stafford has recorded at least a point in six of those seven games, including six (4+2) in his last four against Edmonton.

FINISHING STRONG AFTER THE BREAK
Buffalo is 545-404-186 (.562) all-time in games after the All-Star break. This includes a record of 94-51-24 (.627) in those games since the lockout. The Sabres are 0-1-0 since the 2015 NHL All-Star Game. These totals do not include games after breaks for the Olympic Games.

LOGGING BIG MINUTES

• Tyler Myers leads all Sabres and ranks eighth in the league with an average time on ice of 25:15 per game.
• He skated a team-high 22:09 on Jan. 6 at NJD in his return from a lower-body injury that sidelined him for seven games and has topped 23 minutes in six of seven games played since then.
• Myers has averaged 24:07 of ice time in his last 10 games despite playing only 13:10 in the game in which he sustained his injury. He entered that game having averaged 28:11 in the previous 10 games; it was the highest 10-game average of his career.
• Myers last led the Sabres in ice time in a season in his rookie season of 2009-10, when he averaged 23:44 per game.

IN THE LINE OF FIRE

• Josh Gorges ranks second in the NHL with 131 blocked shots despite missing nine games to injury this season. He has ranked in the top 10 in the NHL in blocked shots in each of the last three seasons: 2011-12, 250 (1st); 2012-13, 116 (7th); 2013-14, 117 (T-5th)
• Gorges has blocked 12.9 percent of all opponent shot attempts taken with him on the ice this season, ranking third among NHL defensemen who have played at least 20 games. (Shot attempt data via war-on-ice.com)
• His best full-season on-ice shot blocking percentage was 13.0 percent in 2011-12 with Montreal. No NHL-regular defenseman has topped 14 percent in a full season since the league started counting blocked shots in 2005-06.

BUF-EDM CONNECTIONS
Former Sabres:

• Derek Roy was Buffalo’s second-round pick (32nd overall) in the 2001 NHL Draft and he went on to spend 11 seasons in the Sabres’ organization. He played eight of those seasons with the Sabres, totaling 427 points (161+266) in 549 games. Roy led the Sabres in scoring for three consecutive seasons from 2007-08 to 2009-10.

Tyler Ennis

• He and Andrew Ference were both born in Edmonton, Alberta.
• Shares a birthday with Nail Yakupov. Ennis was born on Oct. 6, 1989, and Yakupov was born four years later, on Oct. 6, 1993.

Jhonas Enroth:

• Played with Viktor Fasth for Team Sweden at the 2012 World Championship.

Brian Gionta:

• Played with Benoit Pouliot for the Montreal Canadiens from 2009-2011.

Josh Gorges:

• He and Justin Schultz are both from Kelowna, British Columbia.
• Played with Benoit Pouliot for the Montreal Canadiens from 2009-2011.

Cody Hodgson

• He and Luke Gazdic were born in Toronto, Ontario.
• Played with Jordan Eberle for Team Canada at the 2008 World U-18 Championship.
• Represented Team Canada alongside Ben Scrivens at the 2014 World Championship.

Andrej Meszaros:

• Played with Teddy Purcell for the Tampa Bay Lightning during the 2009-10 season.
• Played with Matt Fraser for the Boston Bruins for part of the 2013-14 season.

Matt Moulson:

• Played with Teddy Purcell for the Los Angeles Kings from 2007-2009.

Tyler Myers:

• Played with Jordan Eberle for Team Canada at the 2010 World Championship.
• Represented Team Canada alongside Ben Scrivens at the 2014 World Championship.

Michal Neuvirth:

• Was teammates with Matt Hendricks for the Washington Capitals from 2010-2013 and Boyd Gordon from 2008-2011.
• He and Taylor Hall both played for the Windsor Spitfires (OHL) during the 2007-08 season,

Chris Stewart:

• He and Luke Gazdic were born in Toronto, Ontario.
• Played with Jordan Eberle for Team Canada at the 2011 World Championship.
• Played with Matt Hendricks for the Colorado Avalanche from 2008-2010. Cody McCormick was also part of the team during the 2008-09 season.
• Teammates with Nikita Nikitin for the St. Louis Blues during the 2011-12 season.
• Played with Derek Roy for the St. Louis Blues during the 2013-14 season.

Tyson Strachan:

• Teammates with Nikita Nikitin for the St. Louis Blues during the 2010-11 season.

2009 World Juniors:         

• Tyler Ennis, Cody Hodgson, Tyler Myers, Keith Aulie and Jordan Eberle all represented Team Canada at the 2009 World Junior Championship. Hodgson and Eberle were first and tied for second, respectively, in scoring in the tournament and Canada won the gold medal.

NHL Draft:

• Michal Neuvirth (34th overall), Jhonas Enroth (46th overall), Mike Weber (57th overall) and Jeff Petry (45th overall) were all chosen in the second round of the 2006 NHL Draft.
• Cody Hodgson (10th overall), Tyler Myers (12th overall), Tyler Ennis (26th overall) and Jordan Eberle (22nd overall) were all drafted in the first-round of the 2008 Entry Draft.
• Zemgus Girgensons (14th overall) and Nail Yakupov (first overall) were both first-round draft picks in the 2012 NHL Draft.

SABRES REAL-TIME STATS LEADERS
Hits: Deslauriers (153), Weber (96), Girgensons (95)
Blocked Shots: Gorges (131), Weber (87), Myers (81)
Shots: Ennis (113), Moulson (90), Girgensons (87)

SABRES’ RECORD IN 10 GAME SEGMENTS [W-L-OTL (PTS), GF/GA, PP, PK] 1-10: 2-8-0 (2), 11/33, 0/32, 33/39
11-20: 3-5-2 (8), 23/36, 4/27, 28/39
21-30: 7-3-0 (14), 22/22, 2/25, 20/25
31-40: 2-7-1 (5), 21/44, 4/27, 19/31
41-50: 0-8-0 (0), 13/35, 4/22, 21/30

OVERTIME RESULTS (1-2; 98-100 all-time)
October 30 vs. Boston: L, 3-2 (GDG-Marchand, 1:20)
December 13 vs. Florida: W, 4-3 (GDG-Zadorov, 0:29)
December 21 at Boston: L, 4-3 (Eriksson, 2:14)

SHOOTOUT RESULTS (6-1; 63-47 all-time)
October 14 at Carolina: W, 4-3 (GDG-Girgensons)
November 2 vs. Detroit: W, 3-2 (GDG-Girgensons)
November 5 vs. Montreal: L, 2-1 (GDG-Parenteau)
November 29 at Montreal: W, 4-3 (GDG-Flynn)
December 2 vs. Tampa Bay: W, 2-1 (GDG-Hodgson)
December 15 vs. Ottawa: W, 5-2 (GDG-Moulson)
December 27 vs. NY Islanders: W, 4-3 (GDG-Ennis)

MILESTONES APPROACHING (Player … Needs … Milestone)
Games Played
Josh Gorges … 1 game … 600 career games played
Points
Torrey Mitchell … 3 points … 100 career points
Brian Gionta … 4 points … 500 career points
Tyler Ennis … 5 points … 200 career points
Matt Moulson … 5 points … 300 career points

RECENT MILESTONES
N/A