After Mittelstadt opened the scoring at the 1:00 mark in the first, Kassian answered with a shot that deflected in off the stick of Zach Bogosian 1:33 later. The Oilers tacked on two more over the next two minutes, one on a deflection by Nugent-Hopkins following a defensive-zone turnover and another from Kassian, left alone to score into an open net on the rush.
Rodrigues brought the Sabres back within one heading into the first intermission, but mistakes added up again in the second. Rasmus Ristolainen lost his handle on a puck at the blue line, leading to a Connor McDavid breakaway. Marco Scandella had a crossing pass intercepted in the slot by Lucic.
"It seems like we let some goals in this game kind of deflate us," Rodrigues said. "It's a minor mistake and one that you usually write off and get back on track, but we let it affect us too much. We let it bring our game down. Obviously, we got the result we deserved."
Eichel echoed his coach in stressing the need to get back to playing the simple, defensive-minded game that brought the Sabres success early in the season.
"We know the way we need to play," he said. "It's tight checking and limiting the other team's opportunities, trying to play in their end and grind them down. It just seems like we're getting into too much of a track meet lately and probably it's costing us.
"We've just got to get back to our identity at this point, figure out what made us successful early in the year and try to get back to it."
The Sabres traveled to Calgary after the game, where they'll practice on Tuesday before meeting the Western Conference leading Flames the following night.
Rodrigues called back to the Sabres' 7-1 loss to Dallas at home last January as an example of how they can react moving forward. The Sabres responded to that game with an overtime win in Calgary, which began a streak of three straight wins on the road.
"You come together," Rodrigues said. "You come together and maybe this is one of those games that gives you a little bit of an eye-opener. You're not going to be perfect all year, we haven't been as of late, and this is one that you almost just want to forget about and move on.
" … It's obviously a tough one, it's one that brings the room down during a game but it's also one that can bring us together. We can turn the page and start getting back to the way we know we can play and the way we played earlier in the year."
