BUFFALO, N.Y. – Some lineup news here from Buffalo, regarding the Avalanche for their game Thursday against the Sabres: 

Vladislav Kamenev will make his season debut. He will take the place of Sheldon Dries, coach Jared Bednar said.

Personally, I’m worried about this, for Kamenev’s sake. He’s going to be asked to come in and play a fourth-liner role, when he’s been bred his whole life as a top-6 kind of guy. He has to do a lot of fourth-liner types of things to impress Bednar, for more ice time and promotions to higher lines. But can he do that? We’ll start to see against the Sabres.

The other lineup change will be Patrik Nemeth, probably in for Mark Barberio. Bednar wouldn’t commit to Barberio being a scratch. Maybe he’ll play 7 D, like he’s done before. But I doubt it.

Semyon Varlamov in goal for the Avs.