Game 65: Deserve's got nothing to do with it

The Sabres fall 2-1 in overtime to the Rangers after playing one of their best games of the season.

BUFFALO — When you lose a game 10-4 at home, there’s really nowhere else to go but up and for the Buffalo Sabres, they corrected virtually every issue they had in that embarrassing loss to Dallas on Thursday night against the New York Rangers Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately, it proved to be an example that you can do everything correctly and not come away with the win.

The Sabres dropped a hard-fought 2-1 overtime decision to the Rangers and while they nabbed a point from the game, it’s not the two points they should’ve come away with. They deserved a victory, but deserving doesn’t mean anything in sports.

The Sabres outshot the Rangers 33-26 and had 62 percent of the shot attempts at 5-on-5 and 69.6 percent of expected goals. It was the sort of game that should’ve been 3-1 or 3-2 in their favor, but it wound up being their fourth consecutive loss and sixth in the past seven games.

“We needed to play that way, especially last game, but we need to play that way period,” Sabres coach Don Granato said. “Tighter defensively. … More structure that way.”