BUFFALO, N.Y. — On the day the Buffalo Sabres signed coach Don Granato to a contract extension, he wasn’t necessarily feeling like he had job security. That was the day before the 2022-23 season started. He had been the coach for one full season after finishing the season before that as an interim coach. Granato still had two seasons left on his contract, but owner Terry Pegula saw enough positives in the direction of the Sabres to extend Granato for two more beyond that at just under $2 million per season. Pegula had already given a similar extension to general manager Kevyn Adams.
“In our profession, there is no stability,” Granato said then. “You’re used to that, you’re accustomed to that. This is nice, but our stability is success day to day. I can’t wrap my mind around it too much other than a few things I will share. This is the place I want to be, this is a place I want to make right and I want to win here. I think what we’re building and the progression, the sequential movements that we’ve seen and we’ll continue to see, we are going to win here and we are going to be successful doing what we’re doing.”
Two seasons have passed since Granato made those comments. In that time, the Sabres finished with 91 points in 2022-23 and are now guaranteed to finish with fewer points this season. Their loss to the Stars on Tuesday clinched a 13th straight season without the playoffs after they were a popular pick to take the next step and get to the postseason. Instead, the Sabres were one of the most disappointing teams in hockey.
“Expectations I look at as a privilege,” Granato said Thursday. “The expectations come because we’ve moved this thing to a point where expectations have risen. I’m happy for that. I’ve been in this situation where this is all natural and this is all something we have to go through to get to the next level. You perform to a certain level, you raise expectations. For me, I’m happy we’re here. This is great. That means we did some really good work. Look at where we were two years ago. This is the territory. It comes down to winning more hockey games.
GO DEEPER
Sabres miss playoffs, tie longest active playoff drought in pro sports
Despite some turbulent moments, Granato has kept his job. He will finish the year as the sixth-longest-tenured coach in the NHL and the longest-tenured coach without a playoff appearance. He’s now coached the seventh-most games without a playoff appearance in NHL history. The Sabres have three games left in a season that has cast some doubt about what they’re building under Granato and Adams.
The Sabres have allowed two or more goals in the first period of a game 29 times. They are 7-22-1 in those games. Buffalo had also allowed the most first-period goals in the NHL this season and had a first-period goal differential of minus-33. That was a big reason the Sabres played October, November and December at a 73-point pace, the sixth-worst points percentage in the NHL during that span.
Buffalo also took a significant step back offensively. After finishing third in the NHL in goals scored last season, the Sabres are now 21st in scoring. After scoring the fourth-most goals at five-on-five last season, the Sabres are 10th in that department this season. This season, the Sabres are 22nd in the NHL at generating high-danger chances at five-on-five, according to Natural Stat Trick. Last season, they were 16th.
The biggest factor in the scoring dropoff, though, was the Sabres’ power play, which ranks 29th in the NHL converting 16.5 percent of chances. Last season, the Sabres had the ninth-best power play in the league.
The message Granato tried to send often this season is that the Sabres were learning to become a better defensive team and that the attention to defense took away from the offense.
The most dramatic improvement came in the raw goals against numbers. The Sabres have the 13th-best goals-against average in the NHL this season. They were 26th last season. But a peek under the hood shows the goaltending they got from Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was the major factor there.
The improvement in the underlying defensive metrics hasn’t been drastic. The Sabres have allowed the seventh-most high-danger chances in the NHL at five-on-five this season. Last season, they allowed the fourth most. Last season, they allowed the 11th-most scoring chances against at five-on-five. This season, they’ve allowed the 14th-most. Last season, the Sabres were 28th on the penalty kill, this season they are 16th. The Sabres are still a below-average defensive team.
On Tuesday night, the Sabres were eliminated from the NHL playoffs for a 13th straight season. Granato has now been the head coach for three of those seasons and was an assistant for two others. That’s five seasons of the drought he’s been part of. Granato inherited a rough situation when he took over as the interim coach in March of 2021. In the rest of that calendar year, the Sabres traded disgruntled veterans Rasmus Ristolainen, Sam Reinhart and Jack Eichel. They committed to building through the draft and developing from within the organization. Granato’s track record with the United States National Team Development Program made him the right man for the job. The individual development of players like Tage Thompson and Rasmus Dahlin, among others, reflected that.
A strategy like this one requires a degree of patience. Of the 30 draft picks Adams has made since 2020, only four have reached full-time NHL status. Zach Benson, Owen Power, JJ Peterka and Jack Quinn all look like potential core pieces for the Sabres’ roster. If the Sabres can get similar results from any of the three first-round picks they had in 2022, there is hope the patient approach can yield results. They have a promising young blueline led by Rasmus Dahlin, Bowen Byram, Power and Mattias Samuelsson. Thompson, Alex Tuch and Dylan Cozens all regressed statistically this season, but they showed their potential last season.
Putting the future and potential aside, though, the Sabres’ stated goal at the outset of this season was winning. And this team came up short in a season in which the Eastern Conference wild-card race was wide open. Even if you believe the NHL changes coaches too frequently, three full seasons should be plenty of time to determine whether Granato can get this team to the next level. For the first time since the Sabres removed the interim tag and made him the permanent coach, Granato’s future is uncertain.
“When I was here as the interim coach I took it upon myself to say, ‘I don’t know if I’m going to be the next coach, but coach the right way,’” Granato said. “You’re in these positions and you have to stay very focused on what you do every day … For me, I have to do my job every day. It’s to help this team and to help this franchise get better every day. That’s my focus every day. That’s my drive every day. I don’t know any other way to do things.”
The hockey case to keep Granato has gotten flimsier. Adams could spin it by saying he wants to let Granato see this rebuild through. The team is clearly in a better place than when Granato took over. Maybe internally Adams and company really thought next season was the one they were building toward. That wasn’t the public message that they sent, but signing Granato to an extension with two years left on his original deal might be a hint that owner Pegula was convinced of a longer timeline.
The decisions the Sabres make this offseason, starting with Granato’s future, will be a reflection of Pegula. The Sabres have missed the playoffs in all 13 of his full seasons of ownership. They’ve missed the playoffs more in the last 13 seasons than they did in the 40 seasons prior to Pegula’s ownership. When he bought the team, Pegula said there would be no financial mandates on the Sabres’ hockey department. That changed in 2020 when the pandemic impacted the team’s bottom line. Pegula said he wanted the Sabres to be “effective, efficient and economic.” Pegula did not conduct a general manager search when he fired Jason Botterill and hired Adams. In each of the last four seasons, the Sabres have ranked in the bottom five of the league in payroll. Some of that is because of the aforementioned youth on the roster, but it has raised fair questions about Pegula’s willingness to spend on the Sabres.
So will Pegula pay Granato just under $4 million to not coach the next two seasons on top of paying another coach? We know he’s willing to spend freely on the Buffalo Bills, and this offseason represents his best chance to show a similar financial commitment to the Sabres. He just saved $18.5 million in cash with the Bills’ trade of Stefon Diggs. Maybe he can use some of that to help the hockey team. The arena will get some overdue upgrades this offseason, but the on-ice product needs help, too. Revamping the coaching staff by either replacing Granato or his assistants would be a start. Spending to the cap would be nice, too.
How many other NHL franchises would maintain the status quo in this situation? Pegula is the lone constant in the Sabres’ 13-season playoff drought and he’s the one with the most power to change it.
(Photo: Bill Wippert / NHLI via Getty Images)
