"We have no one to blame or point fingers at other than our own special teams," co-captain Chris Drury said.
"I think we've got a bad powerplay. We can't score a goal, and we can't move the puck," said right wing Maxim Afinogenov.
Head coach Lindy Ruff is tinkering with personnel and is being quite vocal with his players about his high standards for this talented group.
At Thursday's practice, Ruff and co-captain Daniel Briere were seen having a rather heated conversation that they both later brushed aside.
You wouldn't think there would be reason to worry when your team hits the 60-point mark at the turn of the calendar year and starts getting visions of the President's Trophy, but make no mistake – there are issues here.
The latest change has forward Jason Pominville replacing Jaroslav Spacek on the point with Brian Campbell, and Briere, Drury, and Paul Gaustad up front.
Gaustad is an experiment which may not last, because for all of his hard work he simply doesn't have the soft hands and closing ability of teammates such as Thomas Vanek in front of the net.
Past post-seasons are littered with regular season juggernauts who fell early in the playoffs due to their Achilles heels.
As it looks now for the Sabres, the greatest chance for them to be upset early in the playoffs will be too many power outages with the man advantage. Luckily for them, there is still plenty of time to find the plug.
