- 1 Buffalo Sabres vs Columbus Blue Jackets: a 6-3 opening-night rematch, with Columbus on no rest
- 2 Buffalo Sabres: Thompson’s five goals in California and a penalty kill at 67.4%
- 3 Columbus Blue Jackets: 29 goals in 12 games and a .883 save percentage from Greaves
- 4 Free NHL Prediction: Buffalo Sabres vs Columbus Blue Jackets
- 5 About our free predictions
- 6 No commitment from us
- 7 Information changes
- 8 Your responsibility
- 9 Responsible gambling
- 10 Legal age
- 11 About visuals
Buffalo Sabres vs Columbus Blue Jackets: a 6-3 opening-night rematch, with Columbus on no rest 
Columbus plays at home against Dallas on Thursday night and has to be at KeyBank Center less than 24 hours later. That turnaround is where this preview starts, because the last time these teams met, on 1 October, the Blue Jackets beat Buffalo 6-3 with a full summer’s rest behind them.
Matthew Knies scored twice and added an assist in his Columbus debut that night, three days after arriving from Toronto. Cole Sillinger, Adam Fantilli, Sean Monahan and Mathieu Olivier also scored, and Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen stopped just 16 shots in the Buffalo net.
The month since has gone differently for both teams. Buffalo went into November at 7-4-3 after three straight wins, with no regulation loss in its last seven road games. Columbus sat at 5-7-0 after back-to-back losses in Carolina and Dallas, and it has been outscored 39-29.
Puck drop is 7:00pm ET on Friday 6 November. Buffalo hosts Ottawa on Wednesday and then has Thursday off, while Columbus plays Colorado on Tuesday and Dallas on Thursday before it travels.
Columbus took two of the three meetings last season and has now won the first of this one. The Blue Jackets are also 1-4-0 on the road, and Friday’s game will be their second in two nights.
Buffalo Sabres: Thompson’s five goals in California and a penalty kill at 67.4% 
Tage Thompson scored five goals in two nights at the end of October. He had a hat trick and two assists in a 7-6 win at Anaheim, then two more in a 3-2 win over the Kings, the second a power-play one-timer with 6:20 left that took him to 223 goals for Buffalo, ninth in franchise history.
The power play has turned around with him. Before that California trip it had scored once on 19 chances over six games, and then it went 2-for-3 in both Anaheim and Los Angeles. Lindy Ruff tied the improvement to Rasmus Dahlin’s return from an upper-body injury that cost him three games in mid-October.
Jack Quinn and Zach Benson have done much of the work alongside Thompson. Quinn scored on the power play and set up the winner against the Kings, and Benson added two assists that night, on top of the nine he already had for the season.
The penalty kill is what keeps this team from being trusted fully. Buffalo was killing 67.4% of its penalties heading into the Kings game, and it has allowed four or more goals in eight of its 14 games. Its home record is only 3-3-0, with losses to Dallas, Utah and Philadelphia.
Colten Ellis has the better numbers in goal, with a 2.28 goals-against average and a shutout, while Luukkonen made 27 saves in Los Angeles. Alex Lyon, Justin Danforth, Konsta Helenius, Jiri Kulich and Matt Grzelcyk are all on the injured list, so the depth up front is thinner than it was on opening night.
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Columbus Blue Jackets: 29 goals in 12 games and a .883 save percentage from Greaves 
Six of Columbus’ 29 goals through 12 games came on opening night against Buffalo. The rest of the time the offense has been hard to find: the Blue Jackets have reached three goals in only five games.
Kent Johnson has carried it. He went into the Dallas game with 7 goals and 11 points in 11 games, and he scored twice, including the winner, in a 4-3 overtime win in Philadelphia on 27 October. Zach Werenski has 10 assists and remains the main source of offense from the blue line.
Goaltending has been the weak link. Jet Greaves is 2-5-0 with a 3.11 goals-against average and an .883 save percentage over eight appearances, and he’s the same goalie who posted a 1-0 overtime shutout of the Rangers on 17 October. If Greaves plays against Dallas on Thursday, Rick Bowness will have to decide whether to go back to him or turn to his backup on Friday.
The Dallas loss on 31 October was better than the 3-1 score. Columbus controlled more than 70% of the even-strength shot attempts over the final 40 minutes, and Greaves faced only 16 shots, one of which went into an empty net. That kind of territorial edge hasn’t turned into goals often enough.
Ivan Provorov and Dante Fabbro are both back from injured reserve, which gives Bowness a fuller blue line than he had for most of October. Four of Columbus’ five wins came at home, three of them past regulation, and the road record of 1-4-0 fits a team that needs its building to win close games.
Probable lineup Buffalo Sabres: Not announced at time of publication
Probable lineup Columbus Blue Jackets: Not announced at time of publication
Free NHL Prediction: Buffalo Sabres vs Columbus Blue Jackets
Our prediction: Buffalo Sabres to win
No prices had been posted for Friday at the time of writing, so check that the Buffalo moneyline is at 1.45 or better before playing it.
The schedule is the core of the pick. Buffalo will have had a day off at home, and Columbus will be playing its second game in two nights on the road, with a 1-4-0 away record and an offense averaging 2.42 goals a game. Buffalo’s power play is scoring again, and Greaves’ .883 save percentage hasn’t given Columbus much cover when it falls behind.
Buffalo’s penalty kill at 67.4% and its 3-3-0 home record are real reasons for caution, and I wouldn’t lay a big number on the puck line. On the moneyline, though, I’d take the rested team with the hotter top line, even after what happened on opening night.
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