Jiri Kulich (Amber Searls, USA TODAY Images)The news from Buffalo Sabres coach Lindy Ruff was about as bad as it can get for a hockey team -- Buffalo's first-line center, Josh Norris, will be on the sidelines for the foreseeable future after being injured in the Sabres' first game of the season Thursday.
“(Norris is) going to miss a significant amount of time," Ruff told media Saturday, adding "I don’t know what that amount is for sure...It’s an upper-body (injury), it’s not related to anything he has had in the past.”
With the injury to Norris -- and the injury to presumptive first-line left winger Zach Benson, the Sabres' first line is now star right winger Tage Thompson and...21-year-old center Jiri Kulich, and left winger Jason Zucker. Kulich has 64 games of NHL experience under his belt, while Zucker is 33 years old, and he's a clearly not-ideal top-line talent.
So let's run that by you again: Kulich, centering Zucker and Thompson. Does that sound like a line you'd expect to see on a top NHL team? Does that sound like a line to rival that of a true Stanley Cup frontrunner? To ask those questions is to answer them. There's really no comparing the Sabres as-currently-is to a real playoff contender.
It all feels like the worst-case scenario arrived in Buffalo, and it arrived far sooner than even the most cynical may have expected. And now, unless the Sabres' vast collection of young players steps up, Buffalo's playoff aspirations could go up in smoke in a hurry.
This isn't to say the Sabres can't overcome adversity. That does happen, now and again, at the NHL level. There are always teams that face adversity and find a way to do great things in spite of it. But the point is that people's suspicions in any one team are valid until such time as the team proves they're worthy of respect. And that just hasn't happened with Buffalo in the past 14 years.
Maybe there's a world in which Kulich steps up and finds a great fit alongside Thompson. Maybe Zucker plays younger than his age and scores between 25-30 goals. Maybe Thompson puts the team on his back in a way he hasn't before.
That's all within the realm of possibility. But the realm of probability is something altogether different. And without Norris in the lineup night-in and night-out, the probability the Sabres can string together enough wins to stay in playoff contention long enough until such time as Norris returns to action is not something that shoul encourage Buffalo fans to be optimistic.
The truth is that the Sabres have absorbed a massive blow to their playoff hopes, literaqlly in the first game of the season. It really feels like things couldn't have gone worrse for Buffalo. And in the immediate days and weeks ahead, the Sabres will either demonstrate why they're a different (read: better) team than the ones they've been in their playoff drought, or whether they're the same franchise that has come to be known as perennial disappointments.