How a former Utah Hockey Clubber helped revive the NHL’s most cursed franchise

Tyler Myers, freshly acquired by the Dallas Stars, is the only active NHL player who has suited up for the Buffalo Sabres in the playoffs. Everyone else from the 2010-11 team is retired.

That’s how long it’s been since hockey’s most cursed franchise last made the postseason.

It’s been season after season of not just heartbreak, but hopelessness for Sabres fans. The only thing they’ve had to cheer for has been the draft lottery, where they’ve been awarded two first overall and two second overall picks in that span.

But that still hasn’t changed much.

Even when the Sabres get good players, it seems like those players break out the moment they leave Buffalo. Imagine having Jack Eichel, Sam Reinhart, Brandon Hagel, Brandon Montour, Ryan O’Reilly and Linus Ullmark all back on the team.

This season didn’t begin much differently than the previous 14. By the end of November, the Sabres were the worst team in the Eastern Conference, leading to Spittin’ Chiclets host Ryan Whitney’s infamous comment that there was a “0.0% chance” they’d make the playoffs.

Whitney laughs about that now, as the Sabres are the top team in the Atlantic Division and the fourth-best in the NHL.

Everyone has been trying to figure out what has changed. The only major thing, at least on the surface, is a GM change — but that doesn’t typically produce immediate results.

One thing that can’t be understated, though, is the summertime addition of Josh Doan.

Doan accompanied Michael Kesselring in a trade to the Sabres, which saw JJ Peterka join the Utah Mammoth.

The move has worked out well for both teams, with Doan breaking out offensively for Buffalo and Peterka helping leaps and bounds defensively for Utah (Kesselring’s season has been hindered by multiple injuries, so the jury is still out on him).

Doan boils his growth down to opportunity. He split last season between the NHL and the AHL, which can make it difficult to find consistency. In this, his first full NHL season, he looks like a star in the making.

In addition to his 21 goals and 44 points through 67 games, he’s fifth in the entire NHL in takeaways. Two goals last Sunday earned him the first star of the game in an all-time matchup, an 8-7 Sabres win over the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Josh Doan opens the scoring for the @BuffaloSabres in this HUGE Atlantic Division showdown! 👀 pic.twitter.com/6yEhtms0du

— NHL (@NHL) March 8, 2026

“I’ve been given an unbelievable opportunity here to grow as a player and a person, and I think it just meshed well, that myself and this group kind of came together and we got something going right now,” Doan told Buffalo Hockey Beat in January.

That meshing has already paid off monetarily for the 24-year-old. He inked a seven-year contract extension in January worth $48.65 million. Not bad for a guy who went undrafted in his first year of eligibility.

Buffalo likes him for what he brings as both a player and a teammate.

“Josh is a player that impacts the team both on and off the ice,” said Sabres GM Jarmo Kekäläinen after announcing the contract extension. “He works hard, is competitive and skilled, and his game is going to continue to develop. We believe he will be a core piece of this team moving forward and I am excited to have him as a Buffalo Sabre long term.”

Added teammate Tage Thompson: “He’s one of those guys that will go to war for you and do anything to help the team win. That’s what we need. I think both those guys bring that edgy playoff hockey to the regular season, which is going to help us make the playoffs.”

Doan is far from the only Sabre to show up strong this year.

Rasmus Dahlin is on pace for 74 points as a defenseman; Alex Tuch is due for a new contract and he’s playing like it; Thompson got a taste of winning at the Olympics and wants to do it in the NHL, too; Alex Lyon has stabilized a faltering team for the third time in his career.

And for the first time in a generation, the team was a buyer at the trade deadline, adding Luke Schenn, Logan Stanley, Tanner Pearson and Sam Carrick.

“I feel great for them,” said Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff of the players who have struggled through hard times in Buffalo for so long. “Just to see all the smiles on the faces, to see the reaction to them coming in the room, it puts a smile on a coach’s face. … That’s my kind of hockey.”

Ruff has seen it all in Buffalo. He spent 10 seasons there as a player (three of them as captain). He coached them for 15 years in his first stint, reaching the Stanley Cup Final in 1999, then came back after 12 years with other teams to coach them for a second time.

He was fired a season and a quarter into what’s now the longest playoff drought in NHL history — and it seems as though he’ll be the one to get them back there.