Buffalo Sabres vs Anaheim Ducks prediction: Sabres and Ducks bring two shaky creases to Honda Center

Two crease questions

This game will likely be decided by which goalie stops the easy ones. Buffalo's team save percentage of 87.3% ranks 29th of 32, and Anaheim's 87.0% is 30th. That is the season so far for two clubs that have handed out a lot of goals.

The Sabres' starter is unsettled, but Colten Ellis may be back in net after he was named Player of the Game in Tuesday's 2-0 shutout in San Jose. The gap matters: Ellis owns a .902 save percentage this season, Luukkonen .866. With Alex Lyon on injured reserve after a setback, it is a two-man decision.

For Anaheim, Lukas Dostal is the probable starter after working Tuesday's game against Vancouver, though the Ducks have not confirmed it. His .872 save percentage and 3.56 goals-against average leave little room for error.

Anaheim's power-play edge

Special teams tilt toward the home side. The Ducks convert 23.7% of their power plays (power-play goals per opportunity), 9th in the league. Buffalo's penalty kill, which measures how often a team survives a shorthanded stretch, stops just 71.4%, 25th.

The catch is discipline. Anaheim goes shorthanded 4.08 times a game, 30th, and Buffalo draws the 8th-most power plays. That should give the Sabres chances, but their power play converts at 9.8%, dead last. Extra Buffalo opportunities have not turned into goals; extra Anaheim chances usually have.

Few shots, sharp finishing

The Ducks rarely control play. Their shot share, a team's portion of all shots in its games, is 45.9%, 28th. Yet they shoot 13.1%, 7th, a finishing rate that has kept them in games they were outshot in. A dozen games is a small sample, and that kind of shooting tends to cool.

Leo Carlsson is the engine, with 15 points and four goals on just 15 shots. Beckett Sennecke leads the team in goals. Buffalo leans on volume: Tage Thompson has 51 shots, the most among the Sabres' key players, and Jack Quinn leads them in goals. Lindy Ruff split up the Benson-Ostlund-Quinn trio this week, moving Zach Benson to the top line with Josh Doan taking his spot. Buffalo's Zellweger also gets a look at his former team.

Bodies missing on both benches

Buffalo arrives without Jiri Kulich, who entered concussion protocol after taking a puck to the face in practice and as of Monday had not cleared to fly west. Justin Danforth (upper body) missed Tuesday's game and is day-to-day. Sam Carrick and Matt Grzelcyk remain on injured reserve.

Anaheim is thinner up front. Troy Terry is on long-term injured reserve after hip surgery, and Ryan Poehling is out with an MCL sprain expected to cost him six to eight weeks. Defenseman Pavel Mintyukov went on injured reserve last week. The Ducks have also struggled at Honda Center, going 1-3-1.

What the market says

Books make Buffalo a -134 favorite, with Anaheim at +115 and the Ducks getting +1.5 on the puck line. The total sits at 6.5, where it was when our feed first recorded the game, so there has been no movement to read.

The totals history splits by team. Buffalo has gone over in 7 of its 12 games, while Anaheim has gone under seven times. The Sabres are also 7-5 on the puck line. If Ellis starts, Buffalo's case as favorite looks firmer; if it is Luukkonen, two struggling goalies share the ice.