The Buffalo Sabres have the longest playoff drought in NHL history at 14 seasons.

It’s a phrase fans have heard ad nauseam.

This might be the year it disappears into the ether — though things didn’t look that way in the fall.

The Sabres began the season with three straight losses and ended the month of November with a record of 10-11-4. It certainly appeared the drought was going to extend to 15 seasons.

Then something clicked.

The team snapped off a three-game win streak on a road trip out west in early December. Despite the encouraging turnaround, owner Terry Pegula decided to pull the plug on general manager Kevyn Adams after almost six years. Adams was replaced with Jarmo Kekäläinen, who was hired in May in an advisory role. Kekäläinen brought decades of front office experience with him, and his no-nonsense attitude had an immediate impact.

In an interview with podcast Spittin’ Chiclets, star forward Tage Thompson said Kekäläinen told the team, “You’re all pretty much all expendable and no one is safe. We’re going to start working, and if you don’t want to work, you’re not going to be on the team.”

The message was heard loud and clear.

The Sabres would go on to have the best 25-game stretch in franchise history, going 20-4-1. They would show heart and consistency.

Their star players, like Thompson and defenseman Rasmus Dahlin, are playing like star players. Thompson has scored 30 goals for the fourth time in five years, and Dahlin has notched 20 points in his last 16 games.

Forwards Zach Benson and Josh Doan, who freshly inked a seven-year contract extension, are nightmares for opponents while on the forecheck, with the latter among the league leaders in takeaways.

Head coach Lindy Ruff has trusted rookie Noah Östlund in a variety of roles, a rare feat for a young player under the veteran bench boss.

“He’s been a really good player for us,” Ruff said in late December. “We’re starting to use him on the [penalty] kill now, and I think that’s an area we know we can use him on, the power play.”

Forwards Alex Tuch and Ryan McLeod have become the team’s best two-way duo since Craig Ramsay and Don Luce in the ’70s, leading one of the league’s top penalty kill units and adding 15 shorthanded goals over the last two years between them.

Defenseman Mattias Samuelsson, a potential buyout candidate over the summer, has become a revelation on both ends of the ice, scoring 11 goals so far and crushing opposing forwards with his massive frame.

“He’s just hard to play against each and every night for their top guys,” Tuch said of Samuelsson in late November. “I can see they’re getting frustrated out there playing against him.”

The team’s three-goaltender rotation became a blessing in disguise, with Alex Lyon setting a team record of 10 straight wins, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen having one of the best months of his career and Colten Ellis stepping in when either goalie became hurt.

Ruff, in his second stint with the Sabres, has seen this group of players truly become a team.

“You heard [former co-captain] Danny Briere talk about the team and how it came together [in 2005] and I really think our team has come together like that,” Ruff said after the 2005-06 team reunion night in January. “We’ve become a tight group.”

Kekäläinen in December told the team to forget about the 14-year playoff drought and the players have listened. They don’t want to just squeak into the playoffs. They have their eyes on a much higher prize.

“We’re coming in with a lot of confidence. Everybody’s coming in trying to prove themselves and we’re trying to prove as a team that we’re legit. We’re not just going to go for the playoffs. We’re going to go for the [Stanley] Cup,” Tuch said last week. “That’s our goal — to get better each and every day. That’s it. That’s the end goal, honestly.”

And while the team has seen unprecedented success, it has not come without its challenges. The health of players like forward Josh Norris, a high-impact top-six forward when he actually plays, is a major question mark heading down the stretch. Tuch’s pending unrestricted free agent status has been an elephant in the room. The team also hit a bit of a slide in the week before the Olympic break, going 2-2-1 in their last five games.

But with a record of 32-19-6 and a comfortable Wild Card playoff position, fans have every reason to be optimistic that this year might be the year the drought is snapped.

“We’ve got something really good going and it doesn’t feel fabricated,” Dahlin said in January. “It feels real and I think everyone in the room believes it, as well.”