Waiting

I absolutely hate this week.

For most hockey-heads this is one of the best weeks of the year. Over half of the league has qualified for the playoffs and dreams of lifting the Cup are still alive for most. Once your team locks up a playoff seed, anything can happen.

For me, though, I just can't stand the wait.

For about the last 3 months we've known the Sharks would make the playoffs. I've hated waiting this last week for the first playoff puck to drop.

For 10 months of the year, I wait for the only games that matter. The games of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

And then, there is the worst wait of all. For the better part of a decade, the San Jose Sharks have been a favorite to defeat all challengers and to raise a Stanley Cup Championship banner to the rafters of HP Pavilion. Fellow Sharks fans, I don't need to tell you that this has been the most excruciating wait of all. It has been long, it has been painful, and worst of all, we don't know when it will end.

But none of that matters at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, April 16, 2009.

The year-long wait for the San Jose Sharks Stanley Cup playoff run is over.

The 3 months of waiting for the grinding regular season to finally end is over.

The 10 months of waiting for the Sharks to get another chance at glory is over.

And for a few weeks, we San Jose Sharks fans can forget the past and live for the future. The puck will drop tomorrow night at center ice and 17,000 of my closest friends will turn the Shark Tank into a cacophonous house of horrors for any team unfortunate enough to enter. This is my favorite moment of the year.

It's playoff time. LET'S GO SHARKS!!!