Victor Olofsson missed eight games in November with a wrist injury that restricted his ability to shoot the puck. The injury forced Olofsson to put more emphasis on other aspects of his game to make him a more complete player, rather than just a goal scorer.
It's paid off recently. Olofsson snapped his 30-game goal scoring drought with two goals, including the game-winner, against the New York Islanders on February 15. He has 11 goals and seven assists since that night, including 11 points (6+5) in his last 10 games.
"I look at myself as an offensive player and I want to produce goals and score points," Olofsson said. "I didn't do that for a while during this season and it was obviously frustrating. But I feel like it's something that I can look back on, and learn from."
Granato commended the recent success that Victor Olofsson has had as an all-around player.
"I give Victor a ton of credit for how he has played lately," he said. "We're seeing the scoring come back that we are used to seeing from him."
Video: AFTER PRACTICE: Granato
Before yesterday's game, Buffalo Bills head coach Sean McDermott spent time with the coaching staff and the players.
"It was a lot of fun having Coach McDermott] around and to be able to talk about the different nuances between preparation of players between the two sports," Granato said. "I was obviously picking his brain a lot and asking how they do things… they have a pretty big operation over there with 18 coaches on staff, so I'm glad we are on the smaller end of that."
[Tweet from @BuffaloSabres: Name a more iconic duo...we'll wait. #LetsGoBuffalo pic.twitter.com/CDxe0M7BXG
The two coaches have had open dialogue with one another since Granato officially became the head coach this past summer, which is impressive considering their demanding schedules.
"They've set the standard here in Buffalo, and it's been very motivating for me personally to have a relationship with him and beneficial for me as a coach to view how he operates," Granato said.
Granato asked McDermott when he arrived if he would like to address the team before they went out onto the ice before puck drop, which originally McDermott was uneasy about. However, after spending a few hours around the guys and getting a better sense of the atmosphere and culture of the team, he accepted the challenge.
Here is a video of his speech pregame:
Video: Sean McDermott gives Sabres pregame speech
Granato shuffled the forward lines in a continued effort to give players looks alongside various teammates with the season winding down. He said the lines could change again prior to Saturday's meeting with the Flyers.
"Reintegration and integrating different guys and different parts is so much easier right now for our group and that's really nice as a coach," Granato said.
Here's how they lined up:
| April 15 |
| --- |
| | C | RW |
| 53 Jeff Skinner | 72 Tage Thompson | 71 Victor Olofsson |
| 19 Peyton Krebs | 37 Casey Mittelstadt | 89 Alex Tuch |
| 74 Rasmus Asplund | 24 Dylan Cozens | 21 Kyle Okposo |
| 96 Anders Bjork | 28 Zemgus Girgensons | 29 Vinnie Hinostroza |
| | 20 Cody Eakin | 15 John Hayden |
| LD | RD | G |
| 78 Jacob Bryson | 26 Rasmus Dahlin | 41 Craig Anderson |
| 25 Owen Power | 10 Henri Jokiharju | 31 Dustin Tokarski |
| 4 Will Butcher | 45 Casey Fitzgerald | |
| 33 Colin Miller | 13 Mark Pysyk | |
