TGIF for Leafs Fans?
- January 2021 (2)
- December 2020 (4)
- November 2020 (8)
- October 2020 (5)
- September 2020 (4)
- August 2020 (2)
- July 2020 (5)
- June 2020 (1)
- May 2020 (3)
- April 2020 (4)
- March 2020 (4)
- February 2020 (4)
- January 2020 (9)
- 2019 (44)
- 2018 (86)
- 2017 (167)
- 2016 (138)
- 2015 (73)
- 2014 (140)
- 2013 (145)
- 2012 (162)
- 2011 (8)
- 2010 (12)
- 2009 (12)
- 2004 (4)
Like a lot of things, my feelings were summed up by a Twitter post.
I wish that for just one day I could care as little about the Leafs as my wife does.
I wrote those words on my Twitter account (@PRGolfWriter) in the minutes after the Boston Bruins took a 3-1 lead in their best-of-seven series on Wednesday night, putting the Leafs on the brink of elimination.
I’m a Leafs fan and proud to be one even if it’s made me feel like I’m the punch line in (too) many jokes over years. I wrote about my attachment to the Leafs in Hope and Heartbreak in Toronto: Life as a Leafs fan.
The book concentrated primarily on my seven seasons attending 99 games at the Air Canada Centre. In a twist that was especially cruel even for someone used to being dealt plenty of bad hands, those seven seasons are perhaps the club’s least successful in its almost 100 years of existence.
And though this season was, if anything, more successful than expected, it didn’t get started until late-January, which fills me with dread that the Leafs’ 26-win, 57-point season will show itself to be a mirage.
Would they have finished in fifth place in the Eastern Conference over the course of 82 games instead of this season’s shortened 48?
That’s a question for next season. Right now I’m doing what a large swath of people around the GTA and Southern Ontario are doing: hoping against all logical common sense that the Leafs can win tonight in Boston and live to see Sunday.
Wait a second. Sunday is Mother’s Day. A potential conflict looms: if the Leafs win tonight, the most important hockey game played in Toronto in nine years will fall on one of the most important family days of the year.
Realizing it, I asked my wife and loving mother of our two small children what she wanted to do.
“Let’s hang out as a family during the day – I’m sure you’ll want to do something for the game later,” she said, blissfully unaware at the long odds of there even being a conflict.
“I don’t really care.”
We all should be so lucky.