On life support, but still very much alive

Ronald Neal
Staff Writer
The moral of this week’s Leafs Nation is there is little room for error heading down the home stretch. In the span of a little more than a bated breath, we can go from believers to non-believers moving on to root for their second favourite team in the quest for the Stanley Cup.
After enjoying an impressive run following the all-star game, the Maple Leafs found themselves within striking distance of the final playoff spot with a healthy number of games left to play. Even more importantly, they had overcome the logjam of teams ahead of them and were really only competing with the Sabres and Hurricanes for the coveted eighth spot.
We were so close we could taste it.
That all changed with a string of tough losses against conference opponents.
Following a regulation loss to the defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks, the Leafs took their show on the road and headed to Long Island for a match against the New York Islanders. This is a game we should have won, and given the fact we have won against teams much better than the Islanders, the overtime loss was surprising and unwelcome. They were flat, uninspired and disappointing. The only thing that could be taken away from that game was that we managed to earn the single crucial point necessary to keep the dream alive. And so we keep dreaming.
On Thursday, we welcomed the Philadelphia Flyers to town, a first place team we had amazingly and unexpectedly beat only one week ago. The fact the odds of us beating them twice in one week were against us was not on our mind. The cold reality of the situation was that, with the overtime loss to the Islanders earlier in the week, we had lost ground in the race and we were practically facing a ‘must-win’ situation.
That is how fickle the hockey gods are. That is how little room for error there is. In the span of less than a week, we went from tasting the playoffs to potentially missing out for the sixth year in a row.
Unsurprisingly, we didn’t get the result we needed. Despite last minute efforts, the team skated away with a 3-2 regulation loss. Oh, the difference a week can make.
All of this set up for a potentially season-ending game against the Buffalo Sabres on Hockey Night in Canada. A loss against the Sabres would have taken the Leafs from six to eight points back, effectively and realistically ending any hopes and dreams of hockey in Toronto this spring. Fortunately for Leafs Nation, the team earned a much-needed 4-3 win amid the closest thing to playoff fever the fans have enjoyed in years.
And despite the three consecutive losses last week, the Leafs are not completely out of this race and still have time to redeem themselves for all those years the team did not make it. With 12 games left in the season, fans are still holding on.