Tage Thompson on Krebs-Thompson-Tuch line for Game 2
tage thompson was listed on Buffalo’s second-line center unit for Game 2 against the Montreal Canadiens on April 6 at KeyBank Center in Buffalo, New York. The Sabres leaned into a top-six look with Thompson between Zach Benson and Alex Tuch, a setup that kept their Game 2 forward plan centered on pace and puck pressure.
Buffalo entered the night with a 5-2 record, while Montreal was 4-4 after a seven-game series with the Lightning. That gave the matchup a different edge than a standard playoff opening, with the Sabres carrying the better 5-v-5 play from Game 1 and a lineup built to keep that edge intact.
Krebs-Thompson-Tuch alignment
Thompson’s placement on the Krebs-Thompson-Tuch line was the clearest personnel note in Buffalo’s Game 2 setup. A second-line center role keeps him in the middle of a unit that can attack off the rush and force Montreal to defend more than one layer of the Sabres’ forward group.
That alignment also told the story of how Buffalo wanted to manage the middle of the ice. With Thompson in that spot, the Sabres did not need to spread their scoring role around the lineup; they could keep one of their most important forwards in a central matchup while still rolling enough depth to pressure the Canadiens all game.
Canadiens forward look
Montreal’s projected forward lines kept Nick Suzuki between Cole Caufield and Juraj Slafkovsky, with Alex Newhook centering Jake Evans and Ivan Demidov on another unit. The Canadiens’ power play had looked terrifying at times in Game 1, so Buffalo’s forward choices sat alongside a bigger task: make Montreal work at even strength instead of letting the special teams dictate the night.
The Sabres were also listed with projected defense pairs of Samuelsson-Dahlin, Byram-Power, and Stanley-Timmins. Combined with the forward alignment, Buffalo’s Game 2 sheet pointed to a team trying to protect its 5-v-5 edge while keeping Thompson in a role that could tilt shifts at KeyBank Center.
Buffalo’s Game 2 shape
For a reader tracking Thompson specifically, the practical takeaway was simple: he was not buried in a checking role. Buffalo put him on the Krebs-Thompson-Tuch line, and that kept him in the kind of deployment that can change a series if the Sabres keep winning the ice around him.
The next test was whether that structure would hold against a Montreal group that had already survived a seven-game series and still carried danger through Suzuki, Caufield, and Slafkovsky. If Buffalo wanted the series to stay on its terms, Thompson’s line was built to be part of the answer from the opening puck drop at 7:00 PM ET.
