Buffalo Sabres Sign a new Head coach from Toronto Maple Leafs…
He was a hot topic of conversation coming into the season, and many had pegged him as the uncontested starting goaltender after his late-season heroics in 2022-23, but with the emergence of Ukko Pekka Luukkonen as the starter, Devon Levi was put more on the back burner as the hype surrounding him cooled off.
Despite this, he still found himself developing quite well and putting up some good numbers in the NHL, and some even better numbers in the American Hockey League (AHL). Despite his split time between the majors and the minors, he was clearly the number two goalie in the Sabres’ system, as Eric Comrie did not have the faith of former head coach Don Granato, and Levi still saw plenty of NHL action.
By the end of the season, he showed that despite his flashes of brilliance, he still had room to grow and that he very much was doing so.
In his time spent in the NHL with the Sabres, Levi had a few games where he struggled to keep pucks out of the net. He looked fatigued and downtrodden as the team around him collapsed and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Some other nights though, he looked like the unstoppable brick wall that many fans had grown fond of in his first few career starts.
After winning the starting role out of training camp in October, he became less of a starter, and more of a supporter as his presence on the team was pushing Luukkonen to be better every single night.
The two of them for a number of games were splitting time in the net and battling it out to see which of them could do better, and by the end of it, Luukkonen came out on top, and that was completely okay. Levi is still young and there were some glaring issues in his games, from some weak blocker side goals against, to some overcommitting on some other goals.
