At The Final Horn | Sabres close out 2021 with road loss to Islanders

Kyle Okposo put the Buffalo Sabres on the board, but the New York Islanders scored three unanswered goals to hand Buffalo a 4-1 loss in the Sabres' first-ever game at UBS Arena on Thursday.
Malcolm Subban stopped 28 shots in his first start since December 17.
Mathew Barzal, Kieffer Bellows, Anders Lee and Noah Dobson scored for the Islanders. Semyon Varlamov made 36 saves to earn the win.
Buffalo has now lost 10-straight road games to the Islanders (0-8-2).
The Sabres' power play was 1-for-2 and the penalty kill also finished 1-for-2.

How it happened

The Islanders scored first on a wrist shot from the top of the left faceoff circle by Barzal with 7:25 left in the first period.
Buffalo tied things up soon after with 1:00 remaining in the period when Okposo roofed one into an open net on the power play.
New York regained the lead 6:45 into the second period when Bellows skated in over the line and dangled his way around the Sabres defense to create a shooting lane and beat Subban.
With a power-play goal from Lee, who scored on a backhand, with 8:35 left in the second, the Islanders took a 3-1 lead.
Dobson tallied with 8:17 remaining in regulation to put New York up by three.
Buffalo went on the power play with 1:52 left and pulled the goaltender to set up a 6-on-4 advantage, but could not score.

Roll the highlight film

Let's take another look at Okposo's goal:

Coming up

Buffalo will wrap up the road trip on New Year's Day with a 1 p.m. game against the Boston Bruins. Pregame coverage on MSG will begin at 12:30. Fans can also listen to the game on WGR 550.