Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Five types of playoff losses (and how to handle them)

It's NHL playoff time, which means one of two things: Either your favorite team didn't make it, or your favorite team is going to lose.

That sounds depressing, but it's reality. Every team that makes the playoffs is going to have to get used to losing. There's a 15 out of 16 chance that your team is going to get eliminated, and even if they win the Stanley Cup, they're still going to lose at least a few games along the way.

And that's going to be painful, because playoff losses are the worst. A fan can shake off a typical mid-November loss within minutes, because the NHL regular season drags on forever. But playoff losses can ruin your night, the next day, and well beyond.

And worst of all, not all playoff losses are created equal. So today, let's look at five common types of ways your favorite team can lose a post-season game, and how a typical fan ends up dealing with them.

The Hot Goalie

The game: Your team plays great, certainly well enough to win if there were any justice. They're all over their opponents, controlling play, generating chances and firing shots from everywhere on the ice. But nothing goes in, because the other team's goalie turns into late-90s Dominik Hasek.

The reaction: At first, you're reasonably OK with this one. Hey, it happens, right? Sometimes a goalie just has one of those nights, and there's not much you can do with it. That's hockey. The key is that your team played well, and as long as they keep that up, they'll win more than they lose and everything will be OK.

But after that initial acceptance, the tide starts to turn. Was the other guy really that good, or did your team just make him look that way? On closer inspection, a lot of those highlight reel saves sure look like your guys just shooting the puck right into a waiting pad or glove. What are we paying all these high-priced forwards to do? And hey, what about your own team's goalie – would it kill him to steal a game or two every once in a while?

Fun fact: No matter how good their own goaltending is, every NHL fan is convinced that at least 80 percent of these games go against their team.

The Big Mistake

The game: It's a close one that could go either way. And then, it happens – somebody screws up. Maybe it's a lazy clearing attempt. Maybe somebody misreads a coverage. Maybe they take a bad penalty (the puck-over-glass rule figures prominently in this category). Or maybe it's just one of those fluke plays, like somebody blowing a tire or accidentally kicking a puck into their own net.

Sometimes, you may not even spot the mistake in real-time; it won't be until the fifth slow-motion replay that you realize what just happened. But one way or another, sixty minutes or more of hockey ends up crystalizing in one regrettable play.

The reaction: This is one of the toughest losses to deal with because it leaves you with a focal point, that one moment to roll over in your mind again and again over the next day or two. Eventually, your brain starts coming up with alternate realities where the play never happens, and your team ends up winning.

Depending on the type of mistake, you might start off with some sympathy toward the player who made it. Really, they were mostly just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But after a few hours of stewing over it when you really should be sleeping, you're pretty sure that there's something bigger at play. The player's mistake revealed some sort of deep character flaw, and you come to hate them and everyone who has ever known them. (This hate will last anywhere from until the next game to the rest of your life.)

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News




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