Sharpen Up: January 30. 2021 | Clear your schedules for an afternoon game

Game Day!
The Buffalo Sabres and New Jersey Devils will square off this afternoon at KeyBank Center. It's a 1 p.m. faceoff on MSG and WGR 550 with pregame coverage on MSG kicking things off at 12:30.
We'll hear from coach Ralph Kreuger later this morning and give you all the updates here on Sabres.com, our social media channels and the new Sabres app.
Here's what you need to know.

Today's matchup

The Sabres and Devils will go at it for the first time this season. The Sabres won both meetings with the Devils last season. They scored seven goals in each game, both of which took place in Buffalo.
Jack Eichel leads the Sabres with nine points (1+8). He's recorded 12 points (6+6) in 11 career games against the Devils, including three points (1+2) in each of his last two meetings.
Jack Hughes, meanwhile, leads the Devils in scoring with seven points (3+4) and it's looking like veteran Travis Zajac won't play this weekend. Zajac, on the cusp of 1,000 games played with 998, was placed on the COVID-19 protocol list and did not travel to Buffalo with the team.
Today's game is the second of 11 afternoon games for the Sabres this season. They won the first one on January 14 at Washington. Buffalo went 7-2-2 in afternoon games during the 2019-20 season, including a 6-2-0 record at home and a 1-0-2 mark on the road.
These teams will face each other again tomorrow afternoon at 1 p.m. at KeyBank Center.
Thanks for the stat assists, @SabresPR, and read up further with today's Game Notes.

Friday's practice

With Sam Reinhart missing yesterday's practice with an upper-body injury, Krueger took the opportunity to make some tweaks to the lineup.
As noted in our Practice Report video (embedded above), Taylor Hall and Victor Olofsson switched lines, while Tage Thompson filled in for Reinhart, who is considered day-to-day and will likely be a game-time decision.
Here's how the team lined up at practice:
Victor Olofsson - Jack Eichel - Tage Thompson
Taylor Hall - Eric Staal - Dylan Cozens
Tobias Rieder - Cody Eakin - Kyle Okposo
Jeff Skinner - Curtis Lazar - Riley Sheahan
Casey Mittelstadt (Taxi Squad)
Jake McCabe / Rasmus Ristolainen
Henri Jokiharju / Brandon Montour
Rasmus Dahlin / Colin Miller
Matt Irwin / Will Borgen (Taxi Squad)
Brandon Davidson (Taxi Squad)
Linus Ullmark
Carter Hutton
Jonas Johansson (Taxi Squad)

Jokiharju was back at practice after missing the past two games with an injury.
Krueger also announced that forward Jack Quinn, the 2020 first-round pick currently on the taxi squad, is recovering from an upper-body injury, but Krueger hopes Quinn will be able to play some games for the Rochester Americans when the AHL season starts up next weekend.
We're eight games through a 56-game season, so we took the opportunity to also look at eight of the big takeaways so far this year. You can read that by clicking on this link.

Birthday celebration, Sabres-style

Yesterday was Dominik Hasek's 56th birthday and the all-time great shared a photo of the cake he was surprised with: