Sharpen Up: March 8, 2021 | Sabres' road trip ends Tuesday night

The Buffalo Sabres got within one in the third period yesterday, but their rally fell short in yet another 5-2 loss to the New York Islanders on Sunday.
The game marked Buffalo's final regular-season game at Nassau Coliseum, which opened in 1972. The Sabres played their last three games there (losing all three 5-2) and will wrap up their five-game road trip tomorrow night in Philadelphia.
The Sabres will also look to snap a seven-game winless streak. They're currently 0-6-1 over that span.
Here's what you need to know.

A look back at yesterday's game

The Islanders scored the first three goals of the game (all in the second period) before Jeff Skinner and Colin Miller scored third-period goals to make it 3-2. Buffalo's play was trending up, but 3:22 after Miller's goal, the Islanders scored again...and then added an empty netter with 2:12 left to really put things out of reach.
Jonas Johansson made 25 saves in goal.

"There's no question that that piece of the third period, you could feel a certain bite and a fight compared to the past two games," Sabres coach Ralph Krueger said. "You get back to 3-2 and then three minutes later you give up a breakaway which was very disheartening again for a group that's looking for a positive result."

Skinner's goal was his first of the season. His last goal came on February 29, 2020 - as span of 24 games. He also snapped a 14-game point drought.
"It's nice," he said. "I sort of take myself as someone that should be able to contribute offensively and obviously that's been a bit of a struggle personally and as a team. Personally, I hope we can build on this and go from there."

The Sabres are now 2-10-1 since returning from a two-week pause due to COVID-19. Six of those losses have come against the Islanders. They won't see New York again until May.
"The individual mistakes that we've been making here in New York are something we need to address," Krueger said. "What is it that's causing breakdowns in coverage of the type that we did not see earlier on in the season and have become a habit? They're just killing us defensively. We're giving up much more in the D zone. So, there will be hockey technical things that you look at.
Read more in yesterday's Postgame Report.
Buffalo will look to pick up its first point of this five-game road trip tomorrow night in Philadelphia. Faceoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. on MSG and WGR 550 with pregame coverage on MSG starting at 6:30.

Miss one of our new video features over the weekend?

We have them for you here.
First, find out more about the team's Learn To Play program and one practice session that's run by current and former professional women hockey players. More girls are playing hockey thanks to Learn To Play:

And we also took a deep dive into why hockey fans love skating outdoors in this video feature: