{"id":102782,"date":"2021-03-17T08:54:44","date_gmt":"2021-03-17T12:54:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=102782"},"modified":"2021-03-17T15:07:10","modified_gmt":"2021-03-17T19:07:10","slug":"sabres-fire-ralph-krueger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/03\/17\/sabres-fire-ralph-krueger\/","title":{"rendered":"The Buffalo Sabres Have Fired Coach Ralph Krueger"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Buffalo Sabres have relieved head coach Ralph Krueger of his duties with the team. This comes after a very unsuccessful start to the 2020-21 season, only Krueger&#8217;s second with the team. The Sabres currently sit at a record of 6-18-3. They have dropped 12 games straight. This has placed them firmly last in the NHL.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/buffalosabres\/status\/1372161544151306241?s=21<\/p>\n<h2>Ralph Krueger Let Go by the Buffalo Sabres<\/h2>\n<h3>What This Means for the Team\u2019s Future<\/h3>\n<p>Krueger was hired only two years ago, following the departure of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/h\/houslph01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Phil Housley<\/a>. The Sabres pried Krueger away from European football, where he had served as Southampton&#8217;s chairman. His career in soccer started in 2014.<\/p>\n<p>The Sabres are in a very tough spot. This is the team&#8217;s third coach since captain <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/e\/eicheja01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jack Eichel<\/a> joined the team. The team sits at the bottom of their division and are contemplating trading <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/search\/search.fcgi?pid=hallta02,hallta01&amp;search=Taylor+Hall&amp;utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Taylor Hall<\/a>, who signed with the team hoping to make the playoffs. They&#8217;ll need to make a series of difficult decisions moving forward; coaching is just the tip of the iceberg.<\/p>\n<p>Whether general manager <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/a\/adamske01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kevyn Adams<\/a> decides to commit to another rebuild or not will depend on his choice of coach. Having said that, the Sabres&#8217; woes go far beyond their coaching staff. Their biggest issue lies within team culture &#8212; how and when that will be fixed remains to be seen.<\/p>\n<h3>Potential Head Coaching Options for the Buffalo Sabres<\/h3>\n<p>While a temporary option will, obviously, be put into place, the Sabres are at the liberty of an incredibly rich coaching pool. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/j\/juliecl01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Claude Julien<\/a> was <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/02\/24\/montreal-canadiens-replace-claude-julien\/\" target=\"_self\">recently relieved of his role<\/a> with the Montreal Canadiens, entering the open-pool. He joins some already intriguing names, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/gallage01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gerard Gallant<\/a> and Geoff Ward, who was <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/03\/05\/calgary-flames-fire-geoff-ward-hire-darryl-sutter\/\" target=\"_self\">recently let go<\/a> by the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/flames\/\" target=\"_self\">Calgary Flames<\/a>. It&#8217;s not sure when the Sabres will make their new appointment but some choices could really transform the face of a franchise that&#8217;s struggled for years.<\/p>\n<p>[pickup_prop id=&#8221;4504&#8243;]<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"PcRJ850VRxViLJsHHz-0sg\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1230671327\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'PcRJ850VRxViLJsHHz-0sg',sig:'I4GPdbKU88dJv66aItN7eAaoCSLabMgHstiRTQ9Hjw4=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1230671327',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Buffalo Sabres have relieved head coach Ralph Krueger of his duties with the team. This comes after a very unsuccessful start to the 2020-21 season, only Krueger&#8217;s second with the team. The Sabres currently sit at a record of 6-18-3. They have dropped 12 games straight. This has placed them firmly last in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3676,"featured_media":102807,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4547,34,4548],"tags":[182,5168,615],"class_list":["post-102782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sabres","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-buffalo-sabres","tag-kevyn-adams","tag-ralph-krueger"],"modified_by":"Gabriel Foley","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102782\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}