Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR Sports Radio 550) – Buffalo Sabres forward Josh Norris gave the fans a preview on Saturday of what they might be able to see from their top center. In the 5-2 win over the Detroit Red Wings, Norris had a goal and two assists.<\/p>\n
Norris was pretty much healthy when he left after the season ended. That allowed him to train the way he wanted to for the first time in a long time this offseason.<\/p>\n
“It\u2019s been probably three years since I\u2019ve had a full summer of training, and not having to really worry about anything major,” said Norris earlier this training camp. “It was nice to just go into the summer and have a plan and stick to it.”<\/p>\n
Norris will likely have Tage Thompson on his wing for a lot of this season. He only played three games with Buffalo after being acquired as part of the Dylan Cozens trade this past March.<\/p>\n
Despite missing much of the last part of this past season with the Sabres, Norris did get to watch Thompson play. He\u2019s also played against Thompson a lot while with the Ottawa Senators over the years.<\/p>\n
Norris feels he has gotten a better understanding of his hard shooting winger.<\/p>\n
“I think you can definitely pick up on stuff just watching him,” he said of Thompson. “It\u2019s easier to be on the ice with him, because you can feel where they\u2019re going to be.<\/p>\n
“I\u2019ve noticed his tendencies, and where he wants the puck. But it is nice to be out there with him and get some chemistry going. ‘Tommer’ has had a lot of success, ‘Benny” [Zach Benson] looks great too, and I think he\u2019s going to have a great year, because he\u2019s sneaky skilled. I\u2019m excited to keep going with both those guys.”<\/p>\n
Norris is expected to help a Sabres power play that struggled for over half of last season.<\/p>\n
“When I\u2019ve been healthy, that\u2019s been a strength of mine. I\u2019ve always had success in my spot on the right side (faceoff circle), shooting one-timers,” Norris said. “But I played a lot last year in the bumper too, some I\u2019m used to playing other positions on the power play. I\u2019ve taken a lot of faceoffs too.<\/p>\n
“I think we both had success shooting, so I think you\u2019ve just got to make it work. We\u2019re both good players, and we need to read off each other. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s a bad thing to have two guys shoot the puck on the same line, so it\u2019s just more trouble for other teams, especially on the power play.”<\/p>\n
Most players set personal and team goals, and Norris is no different.<\/p>\n
“Personally it\u2019s staying healthy,” Norris said. “With the amount of time I\u2019ve missed the last three or four years, I still really feel I have a lot to prove and just to prove it to myself really. That\u2019s the thing I\u2019m most excited about individually.<\/p>\n
“And then team wise, I think we have a lot of great pieces. Hockey is a team sport, and everyone has to do their part. But I\u2019m excited to contribute on both sides of the puck.”<\/p>\n
Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff said Wednesday\u2019s preseason game against the Pittsburgh Penguins will be mostly the guys you\u2019ll see in the Sabres lineup come opening night against the New York Rangers on Thursday, Oct. 9.<\/p>\n
Ruff also said goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen will get his first preseason action, but doesn\u2019t know if he\u2019ll use him for two periods or the full game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR Sports Radio 550) – Buffalo Sabres forward Josh Norris gave the fans a preview on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":181409,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49,48,75,341],"class_list":["post-181408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}