While I'm not surprised that the New York Rangers lost their semi-final series to the NHL's number 1 team, the Buffalo Sabres, it doesn't make the loss any easier. As a season ticket holder, you are in a strange position. You like the team (I will save love for wife and children: the Rangers are part of a large corporation and a game played by sweaty young men, as you know), and make an investment in time and money to watch and follow the team. But the team goes about its own business, and the way it ultimately performs is a result of ownership, management coaches and players all executing better than 29 other teams. You are truly only a spectator, albeit one who is at an awful lot of games and does a whole lot of yelling at the ice from the third tier. So even though you know you're actual role in the team is rather small as an individual, you care. At the games, you realize you are part of a larger group of like minded individuals who collectively push for the team and in fact are responsible for its existence.
And so today, even though it makes no actual difference in my life, I was sad that the Rangers lost. And, though I'll get over it, it does make you wonder what would happen if the Rangers could have overcome the pressure, held their defense a bit better at the end of game 5 and the second period of game 6, and had better than the lousy officiating (no excuse, but it really was terrible) that they received. After all, coulda, woulda and shoulda are much better said in sports than in real life. In sports it doesn't really matter. Sort of....
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