Buffalo looks to build on its historic turnaround. Discover which young stars are poised for fantasy dominance and which prospect offers massive value after a quiet offseason.
Puck drop is nearly here, and with training camps opening across the league, it's officially fantasy draft season. It's been a busy offseason, full of blockbuster trades, big-name signings and roster overhauls that are only just starting to settle.
We're going team by team to help you prepare, flagging a sleeper worth stashing, a breakout candidate ready to take off, and a bust that might not be worth the price you'll pay to draft him. Next up: the Buffalo Sabres.
Buffalo finally put an end to the longest playoff drought in NHL history last season, and did it in dominant fashion, finishing 50-23-9 to win the Atlantic Division. The turnaround came after a rocky start, with general manager Kevyn Adams fired in mid-December following a 14-14-4 stretch and replaced by Jarmo Kekalainen.
From there, the Sabres caught fire, ripping off a 32-6-2 run over their final 40 games, one of the best stretches by any team in nearly three decades. Buffalo carried that momentum into the playoffs, knocking off the Boston Bruins in the first round before falling to Montreal in seven games in the second.
The offseason has been eventful as well, with Buffalo emerging as one of the most talked-about teams in the league amid trade discussions surrounding Winnipeg goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, a deal that nearly came together around the draft before ultimately falling through.
With a young core led by Tage Thompson, Rasmus Dahlin and Alex Tuch already in place, Buffalo now heads into the season looking to prove last year's breakthrough was the start of something sustainable rather than a one-year surprise.
Sleeper: Jiri Kulich
Still carrying first-round prospect pedigree, Kulich is going entirely unnoticed in fantasy circles. He's rated outside the top 800 players and rostered in just four percent of Yahoo leagues.
Yet Daily Faceoff currently has Kulich centering the top line with Tage Thompson and Zach Benson heading into next season, though other outlets haven't penciled him back into the lineup just yet. Kulich is expected to be ready for the start of the season after missing the majority of 2025-26 due to a serious blood clot issue that required surgery.
Before the injury, he'd shown real flashes, recording 24 points in 62 games and adding five points in 12 games this past season. If he lands a middle-six role and stays healthy, Kulich has the tools to be a 40-plus point player, and he'd cost nothing to acquire.
The smart play is to wait for more clarity out of Sabres training camp on where he lands in the lineup, but he's a name worth keeping on the radar.
Breakout: Zach Benson
The 21-year-old winger enters the first season of a new seven-year deal that makes him the second-highest-paid forward on the roster, and he'll be given every opportunity to build on that investment.
Benson finished last season with 43 points in 65 games, a pace just short of 55 points over a full 82-game slate. With another season alongside Thompson on the top line and a spot on the second power-play unit, there's a real path for him to take over the Alex Tuch role, and breakout in a major way.
Despite that upside, he's currently listed around 136th on most platforms with an average draft position as low as 146th, going behind names like Alexis Lafrenière, Evgeni Malkin and Ivan Barbashev, all players Benson has a real shot at outproducing this season.
Bust: Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen
Where there's smoke, there's fire, and Buffalo's known interest in acquiring Connor Hellebuyck suggests the organization isn't fully sold on its current crease situation.
Luukkonen is a perfectly capable option in net, but he's currently going around 115th overall in fantasy drafts, ahead of names like Jet Greaves, Yaroslav Askarov, and further down the board, Lukas Dostal and Linus Ullmark, none of whom carry the same risk of losing their job to a bigger addition.
On top of that, Alex Lyon began cutting into Luukkonen's starts by the end of last season and into the playoffs, and with a contract year of his own on the line, he figures to remain a threat to the crease even if Buffalo doesn't land a bigger name in net.
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