Now that the Buffalo Sabres look like a playoff lock with 12 games to play in the regular season, the focus around the league has turned to what type of team they can be once the playoffs start.

In his 32 Thoughts column this week, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman quoted an anonymous NHL player describing the Sabres’ playing style by saying, “It’s river hockey, although they are very good at it.”

River hockey is an interesting way to describe the current version of the Sabres, especially in light of their 4-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday afternoon. This win was Buffalo’s fourth straight, and the team has allowed a total of three goals during that stretch.

River hockey implies a wide-open style of play that ends up in high-scoring affairs. The 2022-23 Sabres come to mind. They were third in the NHL in five-on-five goals but also allowed the fourth-most high-danger chances at five-on-five and ended up with the fifth-most goals against at even strength. That team could create rush chances with the best of them but did so at the expense of preventing chances going the other way.

This season’s Sabres can still create chances on the rush and score with the best of them. They are third in the NHL in goals for per 60 minutes at five-on-five. The difference is they are 16th in high-danger chances against per 60. Since they started this torrid stretch of winning in mid-December, the Sabres are first in the NHL in five-on-five goals-against average.

The Sabres are still aggressive offensively. Their defensemen are heavily involved in the rush offense and the forecheck, routinely pinching into the zone to keep plays alive. But the Sabres’ forwards have also become much better at reading off those defensemen and covering to allow the defensemen to play that way. River hockey implies a lack of structure, but it’s clear that this version of the Sabres doesn’t have a problem with that.

“Guys are really buying in,” Sabres forward Tage Thompson told reporters after the game. “It’s less X’s and O’s and more will and determination. … It’s just maturity in our game with the puck. We can continue to get better at that. Lately we’ve been really strong on puck battles at our blue line and their blue line, making smart decisions and not giving them free offense. When you do that against the other team, it’s frustrating to play against. We’ve been on the other side of that before, and it sucks. We’ve had an emphasis on taking away time and space from their skill guys. That’s a frustrating brand of hockey to play against.”

This win against the Kings put that attitude on display again. Los Angeles got an early goal on the power play from Artemi Panarin, but Buffalo slowly took control in the second and third periods. The Sabres played patiently, didn’t force plays and eventually broke through early in the second period when Thompson got a rebound near the side of the net and dragged the puck around Anton Forsberg for Buffalo’s first goal.

This was still a 1-1 game midway through the third period when Sam Carrick got the goal that eventually was the game winner. Zach Benson took a huge hit along the boards in the offensive zone to start the play, and Carrick drove the net and finished with a backhand. The Kings challenged for high-sticking but failed, so the Sabres got a power play and scored when a rebound went off Kings defenseman Cody Ceci and in. A late Benson empty-netter locked up the win.

But it was yet another 60-minute defensive effort from the Sabres. They allowed just seven high-danger chances at five-on-five. This is the sixth straight game the Sabres have allowed fewer than 10 even-strength high-danger chances. This season, the Sabres have allowed 10 or fewer high-danger chances at five-on-five in 48 of their 70 games. The fact Buffalo is getting elite goaltending has taken its defensive game from good to great, but these Sabres play with a lot more attention to detail than previous versions. The Sabres are 32-5-1 when scoring first, 22-2-0 when leading after one period and 13-3-6 in one-goal games.

“We have a slogan that ‘Everybody ropes, everyone rides,’” Thompson said. “It means there’s no job that’s too big or small for you to do out there. When everyone out there is doing those little things that aren’t very pretty but that show the guy next to you that you care about winning, it’s infectious.”

With the win, the Sabres are again tied with the Hurricanes for first place in the Eastern Conference and have maintained their lead in the Atlantic Division. They’ve won 12 of 13 coming out of the Olympic break, have a road point streak of 13 games and are on the best 40-game stretch the NHL has seen since the 1995-96 Detroit Red Wings. Not bad for river hockey.

Here’s what else we saw in Buffalo’s win:

1. The play Benson made to get the game-winning goal to Carrick was another example of the subtle ways he can impact a game. Benson played on the fourth line with Carrick and Beck Malenstyn, and the Kings didn’t have a single high-danger chance at five-on-five during that line’s minutes. Benson added two takeaways in what was another strong defensive game. Of the Sabres who have played at least 50 games this season, Benson has the second-highest on-ice expected goal share on the team, behind Josh Doan.

2. The Carrick trade already looks like a huge win for the Sabres. His goal was his fifth in eight games for Buffalo. He had just four in 60 games for the Rangers this season. Buffalo is outscoring opponents 7-3 during Carrick’s five-on-five minutes since he joined the team at the NHL trade deadline. The fact he has another year on his contract at just $1 million is a huge bonus. The Sabres are going to be tight against the salary cap this season, and Carrick will be a bargain on that deal.

3. It flies under the radar because it has become a regular occurrence, but the pair of Owen Power and Bowen Byram was dominant in this game. The Sabres had an 8-1 advantage in scoring chances and a 4-0 advantage in high-danger chances during their five-on-five minutes. The Sabres have 58 percent of the goals when those two are on the ice at five-on-five this season, which is 13th best among defensive pairs with at least 400 minutes.

Byram looks so confident skating with the puck, and Power has taken a big step this year, especially defensively. There has been plenty of debate about the third pair lately, but the top four defensemen continue to be the ones driving this team’s success.