After beating Pacific Division leading Vancouver on Saturday, Buffalo's next five opponents have a combined record of 49-25-8. The Sabres play back-to-back games in Winnipeg and Minnesota over the weekend, conclude their road trip in Pittsburgh on Monday and return to host Philadelphia on Wednesday.
Sabres captain Jack Eichel recognized the opportunity at hand given their upcoming competition but said it shouldn't change anything regarding their own game.
"Obviously, they have a good team over there," he said. "We know they have a good group of players. They didn't go to the conference finals last year for no reason. They've got a lot of the same guys still there, they're pretty comfortable with each other.
"… For us, I don't think it changes our approach at all. We know what we've got to do to give ourselves a chance to win. We've just got to be ready for puck drop."
Although they've managed to produce comeback wins in their last two games, Housley and Eichel agreed that there are areas the Sabres need to clean up. They were outshot in each of those wins after outshooting opponents a combined 129-83 in the three games prior.
Specifically, Housley emphasized the need to spend less time in the defensive zone against a Lightning team that leads the NHL with 3.65 goals per game.
"I just thought the last couple of games we've gotten away from what has made us really successful," he said. "We let that checking part of our game slip. We know tonight and moving forward against these good teams, in the D-zone we're going to have to kill the cycle game.
"Once we start riding checks and we get all over our defensive zone, that's when things start opening up. We get tired. We're going to have to play particular attention down low below the circles."
The game will be nationally televised on NBCSN. Dan Dunleavy and Rob Ray will have the call on WGR 550, with puck drop set for 7:30 p.m.