Sabres Send Pysyk, McCabe To Rochester

The Buffalo Sabres made a pair of roster moves involving talented young defensemen Thursday afternoon, sending Mark Psysk and Jake McCabe down to the Rochester Amerks.

Both players are just getting healthy and returning from injury.  Pysyk had been out since September 23 with an unspecified upper body injury while McCabe suffered a middle-body injury during the preseason finale on October 7.

The moves mean that at least for the time being, Andre Benoit and Andrej Meszaros remain on the Sabres blue line. Both offseason veteran free agent pickups have struggled early in the season, and Meszaros was benched in their last game in Carolina Tuesday night.

A first-round (23^rd overall) in 2010, Pysyk’s regarded as a stay-at-home style defensemen with tremendous upside and potentially a nice, long career ahead with the Sabres. Psysk split time between Buffalo and Rochester last season; scoring a goal and six assists in 44 games with the Sabres and registering 12 points in 31 games with Rochester last season.

He also played 12 games with the Sabres in 2012-13.

McCabe signed a three-year, entry-level contract with the Sabres in April and was a second-round pick (44^th) overall by Buffalo in the 2012 Entry Draft. He skated in seven games with Buffalo late last season and picked up one assist.

Prior to a standout college career at the University of Wisconsin, McCabe played two seasons with the U17 and U18 U.S. National Development teams.

While they’re too young for Buffalo to reap the rewards right now, the Sabres have a nice nucleus of blue liners to build around in the next couple of years.  Psysk and McCabe are part of a foreseeable bright future with Risto Ristolainen and Nikita Zadarov.  That doesn’t include Tyler Myers, who may or may not be part of general manager Tim Murray’s vision of the future.

Pysyk’s stint in Rochester could be short-lived, as it’s possible he’s going down there primarily for more conditioning.

The Sabres next host Florida on Friday night.