MUNICH -- Lindy Ruff has something so rare in sports, a third chance with the same team to reach the heights he and it have never reached.
Ruff played for the Buffalo Sabres from 1979-89 and coached them from 1997-2013. In that time, the Sabres reached the Stanley Cup Final once (1999) and the third round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs four other times (1980, 1998, 2006 and 2007).
But the Sabres have never won the Stanley Cup, and they haven't made the playoffs since 2011, the longest drought in the League.
Ruff is back as coach this season, hired on April 22 to replace Don Granato. He knows the task, and it's not just to end Buffalo's playoff drought.
"Make sure I get it done," Ruff said. "Get it done means win the Stanley Cup. That's what get it done means. It doesn't mean anything less."
Ruff is 64 years old. He has coached 1,774 regular season games, fourth most in NHL history. He should pass Barry Trotz (1,812) for third place before this season is halfway finished. He is fifth in wins with 864, five behind Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice.
Experience is important and a significant reason why Ruff is back in Buffalo, but this coaching life doesn't last forever. This very well could be Ruff's last crack to get it done as a head coach anywhere in the NHL. There is a lot at stake for him in Buffalo. He knows it.
"It's my home," Ruff said. "I've been in Buffalo since 1979. We kept our place the whole time and have lived here. I'm a big Bills fan and I go to Bison baseball games. I'm engrained in the community. All of our friends are here. For me it ramps up a little bit of the pressure to make sure I get it done, but at the same time I look at it as a humbling opportunity."
The Sabres look at Ruff, with his 45 years in the NHL, including his 11 playoff appearances as a coach, as the right guy at the right time for the team.
"I felt that we needed was someone that was experienced, has been through a lot, has won a lot of hockey games and can stand up in front of our team and say this is exactly how we need to play, give the guys clarity and then really challenge them," general manager Kevyn Adams said. "That's exactly what Lindy does every day, and when he stands up in front of our team they know he's done this before."
The Sabres haven't played a game that counts in the standings yet. That starts Friday, when they play the New Jersey Devils at O2 Arena in Prague (1 p.m. ET; NHLN, SN), the first of back-to-back games in the 2024 NHL Global Series Czechia presented by Fastenal.
But the early returns from training camp and preseason games have been promising.
The Sabres have had their NHL roster together since the start of training camp because they knew they were coming to Munich early and needed to be on the same page quickly.
They used the NHL roster in a 7-3 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Sept. 21, when they scored six goals after the first period, and a 6-1 win against the Columbus Blue Jackets two nights later, scoring five goals after the first period.
Buffalo defeated EHC Red Bull Munchen 5-0 in the 2024 NHL Global Series Challenge Germany presented by Fastenal at SAP Garden on Friday, scoring three goals after the first period.
"So far, I've just liked our commitment to the gameplan that Lindy has set forward," Sabres forward Tage Thompson said. "It's very detail oriented. We're not letting anything slip. You look at the preseason games we've played so far, they've been very hard working, very detail-oriented games. The scoring didn't really come until the second and third when we wore the team down. I think that's because of how disciplined and how bought in everyone has been to the defensive side of the game. Stopping on pucks, tracking, closing quick in the 'D' zone, things like that add up in a game and that's what leads to our offense."
That's the style Ruff challenged the Sabres to commit on since Day One of camp. He called it a mentality to be quicker, to get on the inside, to always be in attack mode.
"Put the work in first and have the skill come out second," Adams said. "Before I think we had a little bit of 'Let's show teams how skilled we are' and the work came second. We've had to flip that order, which is what Lindy is all about."
Ruff referenced the need for the Sabres to change the way they defend, especially against the rush, citing the fact that they were last in the NHL in odd man rush chances allowed last season. He talked about the need to improve on face-offs and other areas he called "little 1 percenters."
"He knows exactly what our group needs and he knows how to get the most out of our group," forward Dylan Cozens said.
The hope is that this season Sabres end up like the Devils of two seasons ago, when Ruff was their coach and they were coming off four straight seasons of missing the playoffs.
New Jersey attacked under Ruff, played fast, and finished top five in the NHL in scoring and top 10 in goals against, setting team records with 52 wins and 112 points, reaching the second round of the playoffs.
"I just want to get them over the hump," Ruff said of the Sabres. "For me, I look back, playing career and coaching career, to get another shot at it, it's a little surreal."
