Sabres’, Ducks’ success this season more than just luck

An optimal NHL season should align with expectations to some degree, but mix in a couple of surprises to keep things fresh. This season, the NHL has completely delivered on that formula. Looking over the standings, nobody should be shocked to see the Carolina Hurricanes on top of the Metropolitan Division, or the Colorado Avalanche leading a strong Central Division. But you’d probably be lying if you said you expected the Buffalo Sabres to be in first place in the Atlantic Division after the trade deadline, or the Anaheim Ducks to have poll position in the Pacific Division.

The questions then becomes, are the Sabres and Ducks having breakout seasons that will propel them into contender status for years to come? Or are they, for lack of better term, flukes? It’s hard not to be impressed with Buffalo, who has vaulted themselves to the top of a hyper-competitive Atlantic Division, and currently sport a +32 goal differential. Anaheim has a slightly stronger whiff of flukiness to them, as their -10 goal differential is only fourth best in their division.

On Tuesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and Steve Peters discussed just how real the Sabres and Ducks are this season.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Buffalo’s the surprise, but Buffalo’s also showing that they’re maybe the better team. I know there’s going to be people who do the whole “Ah, they’re PDO merchants.” I looked at Natural Stat Trick, they’re 5-on-5 PDO is seventh-highest in the NHL, but you look at who’s above them and it’s Boston in their division, Tampa Bay’s ahead of them. I don’t like just pointing to PDO all the time and being like, they’re lucky. There’s more that goes into that. Getting good goaltending isn’t necessarily lucky. Look at the Ducks, their 5-on-5 save percentage is fifth worst in the NHL. Two of the teams that are worse just happen to be in their division with the Edmonton Oilers and Vegas Golden Knights, who are getting the worst 5-on-5 goaltending in the NHL.

You can catch the full discussion and the rest of Monday’s episode here…