Horrible News for the Buffalo Sabres on Sunday

The NHL All-Star break ends after this weekend, which means the Buffalo Sabres will soon be back in action.

The Sabres' next game is at home vs. the Dallas Stars. Puck drop is at 7 pm.

The season is quickly getting out of grasp, as Buffalo sits 10 points out of a playoff spot, with one game in hand on the Detroit Red Wings (who hold the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference).

Unfortunately for the Sabres, they were dealt more bad news.

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The team has announced that defenseman Mattias Samuelsson will miss the remainder of the 2023-2024 season. He will undergo season-ending, upper-body surgery.

Samuelsson's season has been injury plagued, missing nine games prior to now. This means he will play in just 41 games this season. He only played 55 games last season and 42 before that. He's been a good stay-at-home defenseman for Buffalo, but he simply cannot stay healthy. This is an issue that will have to improve, or else the Sabres might try and find their way out of his long-term contract.

In the meantime, more will be asked of defenseman such as Connor Clifton, Ryan Johnson and Henri Jokijarhu.

The Sabres need to do something to salvage the season, whether that's a big trade or something else. Staying the course is not working and if they should miss the playoffs once again, there would likely be considerations made at changing head coach or player personnel in some way.

Hopefully, the Sabres can get things turned around during this homestand.