Hockey fans get ready for a long, long ride

It’s the second season. Make that the real season.
And for fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs, a long season, if it is to be noticed at all.
See, there is a suspicion Leafs fans tend not to notice much going on unless it wears blue and white and we know all about that issue.
Since none of the 16 Stanley Cup participants even vaguely resemble that description, look for especially well-groomed gardens and flower beds in your neighbourhood this spring.
Hey, what are you gonna do if your playoff pool team contains nothing but players eliminated before the wing ding begins?
What it means is the rest of us will be obliged to trudge along this Stanley Cup playoff season without our favourite foils. We’ll get along at least until our pool squad has no chance to succeed.
The longest, most grueling of playoff tournaments in professional sports gets under way tonight with another much-anticipated opening round of thrill, chills and spills. Not to mention cuts, stitches and scraggly facial growths that would make Grizzly Adams blush.
The NHL playoffs are a funny beast. Much like Major League Baseball, the opening round often proves the most exciting and fan-friendly. There really is no reason, it just seems to work that way.
Oddly, the opening round is the point at which teams would seem least likely to pair up well given the nature of the seeding of teams. Maybe because teams are much fresher, and thereby less likely to be beaten up, but you know someone that shouldn’t will get beaten in the first round. Happens every year.
Unfortunately, the Stanley Cup’s endurance race wraps up just about the time folks are heading to the cottages and beaches for summer vacation. For those aforementioned Maple Leafs fans, it will only seem like years since they’ve been gone when training camp opens in September.
But, truly, the real winners can be broken into two groups — those who win the Stanley Cup and those who lose early and can shave those nasty-looking beards.