Sabres 'loosened up' headed to Montreal for Game 3 of East 2nd Round

BUFFALO -- These young Buffalo Sabres are fully into the deep end of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

It's not that they lost 5-1 to the Montreal Canadiens in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Second Round at KeyBank Center on Friday, it's how  -- they were unorganized, made mistakes and lacked conviction.

"The whole team was just sloppy," was the assessment of Sabres forward Tage Thompson after he was a team-worst minus-4.

Game 3 is at Bell Centre in Montreal on Sunday (7 p.m. ET; CBC, TVAS, SN, ESPN). When a best-of-7 series is tied 1-1, the winner of Game 3 is 248-126 (.663) all-time.

So, an angry, disgruntled, embarrassed collection of Sabres showed up for work Saturday. They practiced for 30 minutes, working on zone entries, puck retrievals and a power play that featured revamped units before departing for Montreal.

After the game Friday, captain Rasmus Dahlin said they had some things to talk about and that Saturday would be a big day for them.

So, how did they do?

Forward Alex Tuch said the mood was good.

"Came in, we had a good meeting, got skating out there," he said. "I think everyone loosened up a bit. Back to playing hockey, had a few laughs and trying to stay loose. Trying to build up each other's confidence and getting back to how we know we can play."

The pre-practice conversation was about handling the ups and downs that come during a playoff run and within each series. Many of the Sabres are in their first postseason run in the NHL, so much of this is new to them. 

"We talked before practice about balancing the emotions of wins and losses in playoffs," coach Lindy Ruff said. "Going through this for so many years, sometimes when you're winning, you don't ever think you're going to lose in the playoffs. And then when you lose one, you don't ever think you're going to win again.

"Same type of emotion we had after Game 2 of the previous series. We knew we had to go play really well in Boston. We did."

Buffalo will look different in Game 3, at least a bit.

Forward Sam Carrick, out since March 31 with an injury, is available. He will likely play fourth-line center and should help on face-offs, an area where Montreal is caving in the Sabres. The Canadiens have won 62 of the 104 draws (59.6 percent) in this series despite the disadvantages of being on the road.

The power-play units will be different. Josh Doan, Zach Benson and Jack Quinn were boosted to the first power-play unit, joining Thompson and Dahlin. Tuch, Jason Zucker and Josh Norris were demoted to the second unit.

Buffalo was 0-for 5 with the man-advantage Friday, washing away the optimism of a 2-for-3 showing in a 4-2 victory in Game 1. The Sabres are 3-for-32 (9.4 percent) this postseason.

"Yeah, we're going to shake it up," Ruff said. "We feel it's the right time for it."

The biggest things aren't tactical for Buffalo at this point. Can it be better in the areas where it struggled Friday? Of course.

The Sabres have to be more ready to play and more able to let mistakes go instead of compound. An increased level of mental toughness is what's demanded when you get down to the final eight teams of the playoffs.

"We are just hungry, not content and we get a little (upset) after games like that," Tuch said. "We expect a lot of ourselves and each other. Try to be hungrier than we were, a little more urgency because we know what is at stake."