Housley thought the Sabres did "everything but win" against the Sharks on Saturday. The two teams seemed evenly-matched until the Sharks finally found a way to win late in the third period, with Logan Couture capitalizing on a mistake by the Sabres in their own zone with a top-shelf goal.
Coincidentally, it's in this area that another comparison could be drawn to the team in Orchard Park. The Bills have simply found ways to win tight games as of late, be it Tre'Davious White's fumble recovery against Tampa Bay or LaSean McCoy's clock-eating drive against the Raiders.
Jason Pominville said he's talked to teammates about his time with the Minnesota Wild last season, when the team won a franchise-best 12 games in a row, and described it in a similar light.
"It's not because we were playing well, but we found ways to win no matter what," Pominville said. "Some nights we weren't at our best, we would get a bounce and find a way to win. Right now, when things aren't going our way, it seems to go the opposite. A breakdown happens and they end up scoring."
Pominville said that the confidence the Wild had during that streak stemmed from the team's practice habits.
"Everyone who's been on good teams will tell you that usually practice habits translate to games," he said. "We had good habits. We were finding ways to win, no matter what. It's weird the way it happens. You're down, you find a way to get back. You get a bounce or your goalie makes a save. A lot of thing happen that you find ways to win games.
"But if you had asked our coaches after the streak, they even told us that there were some games that we should've lost and we found ways to win."
The Sabres will become the team that finds ways to win, Housley said, by relying on their system. When they've lost tight games, it's been because they deviated from the simple game that's made them successful. One of the lessons Housley is trying to instill in the team is a belief that, when things aren't going their way, simply sticking to their game we'll bring them out of it.
"All I can judge is what I see right now," Housley said. "And I see a team that, at key times in the game, we sort of break. We have to have a mental toughness in that area where, we can't crack. That's part of the culture too, building that reassurance. Just continue to play the way we're playing. We don't have to do anything out of the ordinary and just continue to pay our game."
In other words, it's all part of the process.
