3 Takeaways From the Sabres’ 7-3 Win Over the Penguins – The Hockey Writers –

The Buffalo Sabres have put together winning streaks before, so winning their last two over the Ottawa Senators and Winnipeg Jets didn’t feel all that special. Typically, little streaks like these are followed by prolonged losing streaks for this frustrating club.

With holes in the lineup, the already disappointing Sabres are seemingly facing an uphill battle. Instead, the Sabres extended their winning streak to three thanks to a major beatdown of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Let’s get into the takeaways from the 7-3 victory.

The Offense Has Been Clicking

One of the things that has jumped out about this three-game winning streak is that offensive contributions are coming from everywhere. Sure, Tage Thompson started things off with his team-leading 36^th goal, but then the rest of the lineup got involved.

Peyton Krebs, Jiri Kulich, and even Mattias Samuelsson all managed to score. The Sabres are very quietly right there with teams like the Florida Panthers, Carolina Hurricanes, and Toronto Maple Leafs in terms of goals for.

There is a good offensive foundation here. The kinks need to be worked out, especially holding onto leads – being near the top of the list of blown leads is going to cause a lot of problems. If they can shore that up and fix the power play, this team will be formidable.

Special Teams Still Suck

Speaking of the power play, Buffalo’s special teams are absolute garbage. They were 0-for-4 on a night in which they scored seven goals. If that doesn’t illustrate how good this team can be offensively, I don’t know what does.

Related: Sabres Have a Lot to Clean Up During the Upcoming Offseason

Fixing the power play needs to be near the top of the list of things to address this offseason. Several games may have gone differently if the Sabres could have scored a timely power play goal. Instead, they failed and eventually collapsed.

The Sabres are a team full of glaring issues. The good news is that, if they fix them, they could actually be quite good. That’s easier said than done, especially with this team, but they can still score even with as bad as the power play is.

Jiri Kulich Is Going to Be a Star

Going back to Kulich, he has shown more than enough throughout his rookie campaign to illustrate that he can be a special talent. Against the Penguins, he managed to collect a pair of goals, bringing him up to 14 on the…