A year ago, simply competing would have been enough to keep Newcastle's players happy, but not anymore.
In the biggest sign of the Knights' revival this season, their players were visibly upset following Saturday's 24-18 NRL loss to South Sydney at McDonald Jones Stadium.
Veteran Jamie Buhrer cut a forlorn figure in the press conference, while usually relaxed captain Trent Hodkinson was sin-binned after blowing up at a referee in frustration.
"We don't want to just be only known as a competitive unit," Buhrer said. "We want to win games."
Last year the Knights won just one match and had a draw.
Of their 22 losses, only four were decided by a converted try or less.
Already this year they have won a game and finished within six in both losses.
In the past three years, the average score between Souths and the Knights was 44-8. On Saturday the game went down to the final minutes.
"On the past three or four years they've absolutely beat the tripe out of us and scored a mile of points," coach Nathan Brown said.
"I don't think there's going to be anyone that watched the game that is going to question the commitment of the guys.
"But today they beat us because they were just more professional."
After they lost late to the Warriors in round one and broke their 335-day drought against Gold Coast the following week, Newcastle could easily have gone two-and-one on Saturday.
They led 12-10 at halftime but caught a kick-off in goals that was going dead on the full to start the second half, and then failed to make it back into the field of play.
"That should have been us putting the ball into touch with the wind and attacking their line," Brown said. "That was a huge play in the game."
Souths scored from the ensuing set, and again showed their experience when they won a scrum against the feed with 10 minutes to play and Newcastle fighting their way back into the game.
"That doesn't happen in today's game," Brown said.
"I think Souths will be saying 'geez, these boys are definitely moving forward', but they'll also be saying 'they make it tough for themselves'.
"If we were just a little bit more professional, if we'd maybe been together a bit more, maybe we could have pinched a win."
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