“Consistency is the hardest part for those young kids, it really is,” said Sturm. “You need the experience and you need those games to go through it. And that’s where we’re at right now. Can they stay consistent? Yeah, there was a little drop [in their effectiveness in Game 3]. It’s hard in the playoffs.”

Get Starting Point

A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday.

Any change likely starts with Hagens. The rookie has just five games under his belt and suffered a couple of tough breaks in Game 3. He fanned on a one-timer from the slot, and he failed to fully block Bowen Byram’s shot on the tying goal, the puck rolling up the left winger’s blade and past Jeremy Swayman.

If either or both of those plays happened in a regular-season game, it wouldn’t be such a big deal. Bad breaks happen. But in the postseason, things are magnified.

“We’ll see. We’re just in the process of going through the game again from [Thursday] night we’ll see [Saturday],” said Sturm, referring to the team’s scheduled practice. “So far, [Hagens] has been really good. He’s given us everything he’s had. And [yes], he had more mistakes probably last game than he’d done in the past, so we’ll see. We’re going to analyze this and go from there.”

Minten and Khusnutdinov, the other “kids,” are valuable penalty killers — Boston has yet to allow a power-play goal in the series — so they are safe.

Three of Boston’s healthy scratches — Mikey Eyssimont, Alex Steeves, and Lukas Reichel — have played left wing on the third line this season. Sturm could slide any of those three in, because the familiarity is there.

Eyssimont would seem to be the most likely candidate. He played some of his best hockey down the stretch and he has some playoff experience — eight games with the Lightning. Steeves and Reichel have yet to play a postseason game.

Eyssimont plays a gritty, grinding style and enjoys getting under his opponents’ skin. His style could help offset the liberties the Sabres have been taking in Swayman’s crease.

On the back end, Henri Jokiharju could be in line for a twirl against his old team, particularly if Mason Lohrei isn’t 100 percent after taking an Alex Tuch elbow to the face in the third period of Game 3. Jokiharju has responded well in the past after benching and had two goals and 6 points in his final six games.

Sturm expressed confidence that the players who have been healthy scratches at times throughout the season would respond well if called upon.

“I believe the groundwork is already done during the season, especially the last two, three weeks in the season. They didn’t play. We kind of try to keep them involved. They played a few games, try to do it that way,” said the coach. “At this time right now, the only message is they’ve just got to be ready. They’ve got to go out and do the hard work, the extra skate. But I think they also know already, ‘OK, if my name gets called up, I’ve got to be ready.’ And that’s what it is. That’s just on every team, not just on us. And then it could be next game, could be the following game, who knows, but when it’s time to shine, they’ve just got to make sure they’re ready to go.”

***

Charlie McAvoy said before Game 3 that officials had made it clear that postwhistle shenanigans would not be tolerated. Such chats are meant to set the tone for a game, but they can also have an adverse effect, causing some players to think too much rather than just playing freely.

“For sure,” said Sturm. “I mean, I address it too, because there’s especially in scrums, you’ve just got to be careful now. I know they have their standard, but also, I see a little bit a difference [depending on who] is refereeing. So yeah, you’ve just got to be more careful, that’s all. And overall, if you look at all the playoff games, it’s been a lot of penalties actually, and it could have been way more, too. So … there’s times these players are holding back because of it.”

Jim McBride can be reached at james.mcbride@globe.com. Follow him @globejimmcbride.