Playoff notebook | Ruff evaluates Sabres’ series through Game 3

BOSTON – The Sabres have Friday off after beating the Boston Bruins, 3-1, in Game 3 on Thursday.

Buffalo holds a 2-1 lead in the first-round series after three tightly contested games. The pivotal Game 4 is 2 p.m. Sunday.

• Round 1 schedule and broadcast info
• Game 3 Postgame Report | Ostlund stars in playoff debut
• Also from Game 3 | Penalty shot highlights Lyon’s standout performance

“We just played three games in five nights, highly emotional games, mentally draining. Just take it easy today,” said coach Lindy Ruff, who addressed the media Friday morning. “… Just get yourself ready for a light skate tomorrow and know that we’re in for facing one hell of a game on Sunday.”

Ruff’s experience – he’s coached more than 100 playoff games – and leadership have been on full display this week. While unhappy with Buffalo’s 4-2 loss in Game 2, he was careful to keep a straight face, publicly, and avoid directing additional pressure his players’ way.

“I didn’t want to give [the media] any more questions to ask them about what went wrong; ‘How come this was bad?’” he explained. “We’ll deal with that stuff on the inside.

“… My understanding was, let’s not get too carried away here, and know that we’ve responded when we haven’t played that well.”

Sure enough, the Sabres grinded out the Game 3 win and have plenty to be encouraged about as the series continues. Here are some notable numbers and trends from the playoffs so far.

Road success continues

TD Garden, while less raucous than KeyBank Center in Games 1 and 2, still had a playoff feel on Thursday. But the Sabres handled hostile crowds throughout the season en route to the NHL’s sixth-best road record, and from Dec. 9 on, their 22-4-2 record comfortably led the league.

“I said, ‘You’re gonna get a different type of atmosphere, but just believe in the way we need to play,’” Ruff recalled of his pre-Game 3 message. “And I thought we executed that to a T.”

PK comes up clutch

Late in the third period of Game 3, with Buffalo ahead 2-1, the Bruins got consecutive power plays thanks to a Rasmus Dahlin interference and a Tage Thompson trip. A team effort – one takeaway, two shot blocks, three faceoff wins in four tries, five Alex Lyon saves – helped the Sabres hold onto their lead. Compared to earlier in the game, they defended the blue line and disrupted Boston’s entries much more effectively.

“The energy on the bench with the Dahlin penalty, everybody was saying, ‘We’ve got to kill this for our captain,’ which is the right approach,” Ruff said. “Whether we liked the penalty or not at that time of the game, this falls in the ‘grab a guy’ category and help him out. Tommer was the same way.”

Buffalo’s penalty kill, which ranked fourth in the regular season, is 10-for-12 (83 percent) so far in the series.

Timmins’ steady play

Defensemen Conor Timmins and Logan Stanley have played 24 minutes together at 5-on-5, comprising a solid third pair over the first three games. Per Evolving-Hockey, they’ve allowed 48.4 shot attempts per 60 minutes and 2.0 expected goals per 60 minutes, making them one of the stingier pairs in these year’s playoffs. Dahlin and Mattias Samuelsson rank highly on those lists, too.

Timmins, also a stalwart shorthanded, seems to have recaptured his early-season form from before his December leg injury.

“He played a real strong game. Physical game. The shot blocking, the penalty killing,” Ruff said. “I thought breaking the puck out, (he) made some excellent decisions that got us up ice. Our puck play leaving the zone was a lot better than Game 2.”

McLeod at the dot

Ryan McLeod won 12 of 22 faceoffs in Game 3 and is 54.7 percent in the series – up from 47.7 percent during the regular season. The Sabres went 2-for-20 at the dot in the first period of Game 2, but they rebounded nicely as that game went on and then won 51 percent of the draws in Game 3.

“There’s no way you walk out of a period and you’re 2-and-18 in faceoffs. We talked about that as a level of compete. That compete wasn’t good enough,” Ruff said, identifying McLeod as his most important faceoff man.

Ideally, lefties take draws near the left wall and righties near the right, but right winger Jack Quinn doesn’t take faceoffs, so McLeod does the heavy lifting for his line at the dot. When he can’t win it cleanly, some support goes a long way.

“He’s got to take them on the off hand, it’s a tougher draw, so we need to dig in harder,” Ruff continued. “And I thought we dug in last night.”

Getting to Swayman

Postgame Thursday, Bruins coach Marco Sturm said he’s “waiting” for the Sabres to be penalized for pestering goalie Jeremy Swayman and digging for loose pucks. Swayman failed to cover a few pucks in Game 3 that led to Buffalo scoring chances.

“If the puck’s loose, we have to be there,” Ruff responded. “Maybe there was one situation where he had it covered that he’s got a legit gripe. I’ve got a legit gripe with Thompson getting tripped a couple times, and there’s no call on that. But that’s part of the playoffs; you have to deal with that.”

Officials send a message

Peyton Krebs received a roughing penalty from a brief scrum in the first period of Game 3, part of the referees’ efforts to keep things under control.

“We were warned that they weren’t gonna put up with the after-the-whistle stuff, and they’re gonna take one guy,” Ruff explained. “And the first guy that puts the fist in the other guy’s face is gonna get called. So, totally expected that to be called.”

The teams ultimately combined for 22 penalty minutes, all on minor calls, down from 94 in Game 2. The more this series leans toward speed and skill, and away from physicality, the more it favors the Sabres.