Unless you’ve been blissfully ignorant about my sports addictions you know I’m a big ice hockey fan. Blame my husband. I was neutral about the whole sport until he took me to a game waaay back before we were even officially dating.
And being a hockey fan, this time of year is extra special. Now, I won’t go into lamentations about the Flyers/Penguins series, but I’ll say The Stanley Cup playoffs mean a different brand of hockey because any game might be the last for a particular team.
Playoff hockey is often full of impossible achievements, tremendous heart, short tempers, and non-stop effort. Not to mention the occasional dose of good luck.
This year, the LA Kings – the 8th seed in the Western Conference playoffs – are making a run for the Stanley Cup finals. No one had any expectations, other than writing them off. They weren’t much more than a place holder.
Good thing no one told the Kings. In round one against Vancouver, they shocked fans and analysts alike, dispatching the number one seed in five games. Surely round two against St. Louis would be tougher. Nope. They swept the Blues in four games. And they’ve owned Phoenix in the conference finals.
Why is the write-off team succeeding? They seem unstoppable – something everyone expected from the number one seed – not from number 8.
In my experience, sometimes expectations get so heavy you can’t do the job because of the burden. That’s been my experience in many facets of my life, from athletics in my youth to my current dual careers of managing my family and my writing. Sometimes the expectations are just too much, and the performance can’t live up to it.
There are also times when the team, person, book, or movie no one expects to succeed uses that lack of attention to race forward to new heights. I think it’s a matter of doing the task (whatever it may be) and staying focused on improving the previous best effort all the way to the worthy goal.
The LA Kings success is inspiring. The team goes out and does the job on the ice with expertise and enthusiasm and they sure look like they can go all the way.
Live the adventure!
