5 takeaways | Sabres open 3-game set with loss to Isles

Taylor Hall could feel the game slipping away from the Buffalo Sabres following a promising start at Nassau Coliseum on Thursday.
"We had three really good shifts to start the game and then it just kind of unravels," Hall said. "You can see every player on our team starts gripping their stick a little bit, starts thinking out there instead of just going and doing and defending hard and playing hard."
The Sabres slipped into a two-goal deficit during the first period and never completely fought their way back in what ended as a 5-2 loss to the New York Islanders. The contest opened a three-game series between the two teams on Long Island that concludes with back-to-back set on Saturday and Sunday.
Matt Martin scored a pair of goals for the Islanders, who also received goals from Noah Dobson, Anthony Beauvillier, and Jordan Eberle.
Hall and Rasmus Ristolainen scored goals for the Sabres while Jonas Johansson made a career-high 40 saves.
Here are five takeaways from the loss.

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1. Individual mistakes pile up

Dobson put the Islanders on the board at 10:25 of the first. The play began as a two-man rush by the Islanders with three Sabres defending, all of whom focused their attention on the same side of the ice. That left Dobson to come in alone as the trailing man on the weak side and bury a feed from Eberle.
Martin doubled the lead less than six minutes later, beating Johansson over the shoulder with a shot taken from behind the goal line. The Islanders held an 18-6 edge in shots by the end of the first period.
"The goals against just deflated us," Sabres coach Ralph Krueger said. "We started making individual mistakes that just fed right into the Islanders' game and their speed. It took some time to recover. There were moments of a pushback in the second period where we really felt a surge. In the third there was a surge. It wasn't enough early in the game.
"They picked up the pace, but it was often off individual mistakes and these were things we were trying to avoid. It's a dangerous spiral right now."

2. Sabres cite "disconnected" game

Hall and Krueger used the same language in describing what has been ailing the Sabres over the course of a 2-8-1 stretch since they returned from a two-week hiatus caused by COVID-19.
"Being connected all through the ice is probably the biggest thing that I can say," Hall said. "It's easy to pinpoint our breakouts on our defensemen but if they don't have outs, they don't have options, then it's really tough and they're a great forechecking team."
"Aggressive" and "connected" are the two adjectives the Sabres want attached to their style of play at their best: five men supporting each other fluidly up and down the ice, gapping aggressively and forcing opponents to play on their heels.
They felt they had it early on this season, when results were lacking but underlying numbers were strong. They started to see results with a five-game point streak before the season was interrupted.
"If we stick to that game and I can sit here and speak to you after a game [about] a connected team in both directions, then we all feel good about our chances," Krueger said. "We're just getting disconnected over and over again, often due to individual mistakes of our own.
"I don't believe we need to reinvent our style of play. I think we want to be an attacking game under strong defense and the principles are laid out very clear for everybody to understand and we're just getting away from them, whether it's mental fatigue or a confidence issue."

3. A mixed night for Ristolainen

Ristolainen admitted earlier in the day that he had yet to completely recapture his game since returning from a severe battle with COVID-19. Even so, he was critical in his self-analysis after scoring a goal in the loss to the Islanders.

"I can only talk about myself," he said. "Horrible game, lot of mistakes, tough bounces. I mean, it should not happen at this level. Made mistakes at the wrong time of the game. I feel like every time we were kind of getting back at it, getting the momentum in their zone and getting some good shifts, then we made a mistake. And I made, personally, a lot of mistakes that cost us the game."
Ristolainen took two penalties and, along with defense partner Rasmus Dahlin, was on the ice for all five Islanders goals. Still, Krueger spoke highly of the defenseman afterward, chalking up the outing to the two weeks Ristolainen spent bedridden before jumping back into high-leverage minutes.
"He fought so hard and battled so hard and competes so hard every night," Krueger said. "You cannot be mad at that player ever. He's as honest as it gets and self-critical as it gets. His situation today was clearly a product of nearly three weeks without any exercise at all. You needed to expect this."

4. Hall gets on the board

Hall's goal was his second of the season and first since opening night. He entered the night ranked second on the Sabres in 5-on-5 scoring chances, according to NaturalStatTrick.com.

"It's been a crazy amount of time since I scored a goal," Hall said. "I feel like I deserved a couple along the way but it's nice to see that go in. It's unfortunate that it came in a loss like we had but there were some things in my game, especially defensively, that I thought I did pretty well tonight and that needs to keep up along with creating chances offensively."

5. The big picture

The Sabres fall to 0-4-0 against the Islanders this season with another two meetings due up this weekend.
"The game is over," Ristolainen said. "You can't change anything about it, you can't do anything about it. So, tomorrow, practice, everyone should work our asses off and get back at it. Lucky right now that we have a lot of games. So, the day after tomorrow we can fix it and go right back at it."
Coverage on Saturday begins at 12:30 p.m. on MSG. Puck drop is set for 1.