It Is Impossible To Not Love This Toronto Maple Leafs Team
I know that non-hockey fans get sick and tired of hockey fans constantly telling them about how great playoff hockey is. But we had 4 games last night and all 4 went to overtime. If you’re not sold on the NHL having the best playoffs after that then I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe you just hate fun and you hate life and you should kill yourself. Don’t actually kill yourself but I don’t know maybe do. And same thing applies to anybody who can’t appreciate what the Toronto Maple Leafs are doing right now.
You look at the Maple Leafs roster today and compare it to the last team that made the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 13-14 and your only have a few crossovers. Bozak, Gardiner, Kadri, JVR and Morgan Rielly was a rookie. For the most part, this team is made up of a bunch of kids who have never been here before. A bunch of guys who had no idea what it was like to play playoff hockey in the city of Toronto until last night. They’re learning all of this on the fly and they’ve still managed to take the #1 seed Washington Capitals to overtime in 3 straight games while winning the last 2. How are they doing it?
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They’re just dicking around out there. Having fun. Down by 2 at home and you think you’re finally going to catch a break after killing off a 5v3 but then Braden Holtby makes this ridiculous play to save the momentum swing?
No big deal. They’ll just chipping away and getting the next one. And the next one. And the one after that. For a group of kids who have mostly never been in this situation before, nothing is phasing them. They literally do not give a shit. They’re just going out there to play some hard dick hockey and fuck around on the ice with their friends. It’s all it is and you can tell how much looser the Maple Leafs’ game is than the Capitals’.
The Caps have a monkey on their back the size of Alex Ovechkin if he just ate Nate. You know those hydraulic press videos? That’s how much pressure is on the Caps right now to not fuck up yet again in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. I don’t need to remind everybody that this is what they do. That they dominate in the regular season only to be taken to overtime in 3 straight games against the 8 seed. They have this entire narrative to rewrite. Meanwhile the Maple Leafs are just playing hard dick hockey and they have a 2-1 lead in the series because of it.
Clearly there’s still a ton of hockey to be played in this series. It could just turn itself into a best of 3 after tomorrow night. But Toronto has at least forced the Caps to win two games in a row now. And they are must-watch entertainment at this point. Matthews, Marner, Nylander, Kapanen. They are all certified studs and anybody who can’t appreciate what this team has done in the last 3 games is either a Caps fan or a friggin’ moron.
P.S. – Leafs undefeated ever since Dart Guy came into all of our lives.
Darty SZN.