Not to throw cold water on the Calgary Flames, but winning tonight's Game 5 against the Anaheim Ducks will be harder than filling a room with happy talk.
Optimist, according to Merriam-Webster: an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome.
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Realist, according to Kristen Odland of the Calgary Herald: The Flames have to win in a building where they haven't won in 21 straight tries. That's since 2006, for those keeping score at home.
Uh-oh, looks like this could be all she wrote for the Flames in the Stanley Cup playoffs. The Linemakers gives Calgary little chance to win.
When the puck drops about 10 p.m. ET Sunday at Honda Center, the Flames will try to defy the odds, their history, the Ducks' 3-1 series edge and anything else you can think of. The Ducks can close out the series and set up a Western Conference finals showdown with the Chicago Blackhawks.
And send Cinderella back to Alberta.
At the risk of sounding like Baghdad Bob, the notorious ostrich-like mouthpiece for Iraq a decade ago, Flames coach Bob Hartley is all positives. Facing shock and awe from the Ducks, Hartley counters with this message: Shock the world.
"You know what?" Hartley said. "We just have to keep building our game. I felt like the last couple of games were very good games to us … I believe in our guys. There are so many good workers on this team."
Of course. Hartley knows better than to whine, because his job is to encourage his players. And he has experience on his side, including his 2001 Colorado Avalanche, who faced elimination against the New Jersey Devils before winning the Stanley Cup.
We won't make the leap of comparing Karri Ramo to Patrick Roy.
Could the Ducks possibly slip up and lose? Could they get caught looking ahead to the Blackhawks and get singed in Game 5?
Realist: The Ducks aren't taking the Flames lightly.
"This is their season," Andrew Cogliano told The Orange County Register. "It doesn't matter where they're playing. Their season is on the line so it doesn't matter. It's in terms of using our momentum and using our building to our advantage and get going."
Defenseman Hampus Lindholm, to The Los Angeles Times: "These games are the games when you have to play at your best. We're going to see them play at their best and we have to match it. Play even better. We need to redeem ourselves a little bit. I don't think we played our best hockey in Game 3 or Game 4. We had a couple of letdowns in a couple of periods."
Optimist: Flames center Mikael Backlund, to The Calgary Sun: "The whole season, we've been coming back from some really tough mountains and we always seem to find a way to climb up on the top. This group never stops, just battles every day. Our work ethic and our character in this room is going to take us through these next couple of games."
Shock the world.