{"id":667784,"date":"2026-05-14T00:18:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T00:18:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/667784\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T00:18:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T00:18:08","slug":"bensons-grit-goals-boosting-sabres-entering-game-5-against-canadiens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/667784\/","title":{"rendered":"Benson\u2019s grit, goals boosting Sabres entering Game 5 against Canadiens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Benson is a player good enough and enticing enough that the Sabres selected him in the first round (No. 13) of the 2023 NHL Draft, a player who scored 98 points (36 goals, 62 assists) in 60 games in 2022-23 with Winnipeg of the Western Hockey League to lead the team, three more than now-Edmonton Oilers forward Matt Savoie<\/a>. He had a career-high 43 points (13 goals, 30 assists) in 65 games this season, his third in the NHL.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been cool to see his success and his path to play (at a young age} at that size (5-foot-10, 177 pounds) and just the grit he plays with, you see how effective he is in the playoffs, and he plays with a lot of energy,\u201d Savoie said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re both smaller guys that like to get on the forecheck and kind of disrupt things, sneaky skill around the net, can score, can make plays and we read the game well, so we play a similar game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benson has seven points (four goals, three assists) in 10 games in these Stanley Cup Playoffs, with his four goals tying him with Alex Tuch<\/a>, Bowen Byram<\/a>\u00a0and Thompson to lead the Sabres, even though he\u2019s playing at least four minutes less per game (15:43) than each of those teammates.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His four goals in the playoffs also tied Pierre Turgeon<\/a> (1988), Dave Andreychuk<\/a>\u00a0(1985) and Alan Haworth (1981) for the third-most in a playoff year by a Sabres player age 21 or younger, behind only Danny Gare, who had seven in 1975 and five in 1976.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Both numbers are within reach, especially now that the Sabres have tied the series with the Canadiens.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s got a ton of skill,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cHe\u2019s a high first-round pick and thinks the game extremely well. I think the poise he has there in the slot, a lot of guys would panic with that. Usually don\u2019t have too much time in the slot there, guys are collapsing on you, and he\u2019s got enough poise to hold on to it and take it to his backhand and get it upstairs quick.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the goal came on the power play, with Benson battling for space in front of the crease with Mike Matheson<\/a>. He was able to create an opening, where he was positioned to receive a centering pass from Josh Doan<\/a>\u00a0in the slot, putting a backhand shot past Jakub Dobes<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I think he\u2019s a player that skill almost goes underrated for how hard he works,\u201d said Sabres forward\u00a0Beck Malenstyn<\/a>, who has skated with Benson in the summer in Vancouver. \u201cYou see him so much in the corners and puck battles, but the plays that he\u2019s able to make out of those high-intensity tight areas are — it\u2019s just phenomenal. His motor doesn\u2019t stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the ice. Off the ice. Wherever.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Benson, as Malenstyn said, \u201cenjoys the bickering, the confrontation.\u201d It\u2019s what gets him going, what makes him effective, what makes him tick, whether that\u2019s with teammates in the locker room, opponents on ice, whoever, whenever.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s relentless,\u201d Malenstyn said. \u201cEverything about his game is relentless. He\u2019s going to be in every single scrum, he\u2019s going to be in your way after every single whistle. He\u2019s going to win stick battles with you 50-50, no matter his size. I think it\u2019s something that probably is ingrained in his DNA.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is \u201can art to his madness,\u201d Buffalo goalie Alex Lyon<\/a>\u00a0said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Benson is a player good enough and enticing enough that the Sabres selected him in the first round…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":667785,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-667784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667784","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=667784"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667784\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}