Game 5 Preview: Winner takes all

Winner takes all.

The type of game you grow up dreaming of scoring the big goal in. A chance to erase previous playoff demons, and write a new ending.

The Stanley Cup Qualifying round between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Columbus Blue Jackets has already seen two dramatic 3-0 comebacks, back-to-back overtime thrillers, lights out goaltending battles, and a rollercoaster of emotions for fans of both teams. Surely tonight will be another edition of must see TV.

The Toronto Maple Leafs will need to find the happy medium between riding Friday's thrill and momentum and a dash of stoic seriousness while entering Game Five. The team met to regroup and refocus on Saturday, with Head Coach Sheldon Keefe stressing the importance of maintaining level headedness to close out the series. "The key for us is to ride the momentum into the next game here tomorrow, but recognize that it's a fresh scoreboard. Teams have had time to regroup here, and we've got a start anew."

Game Two's dominance is a model of success Toronto will look to carry over on Sunday evening, as the defense-first shutdown game was their most complete team effort of the series. Suffocating any of Columbus' opportunities to get on the scoresheet first, and trusting in Toronto's overwhelming offensive talent, is something Mitch Marner believes will bring his team success tonight. "It's something we have got to make sure we have in our minds that we know if we play the right way defensively, we're going to get our chances offensively. And I think we've just got to have that belief that we'll score on one of those chances we do get."

That mentality paid off in the final 3:34 of regulation and overtime on Friday evening, when belief and a whole lot of persistence came through to extend the series against all odds. It was that same persistence Toronto showed in the first 96 minutes of the series when they couldn't find a way to solve Columbus' Joonas Korpisalo.

Both teams have played the same 248:26, trading good games for bad, finding ways to bounce back from their mistakes and build off their success. They've both relied on clutch goaltending, timely offense, and shut-down defending. Each team has found ways to win when no one but themselves believed they could, or let a game slip away when it was tightly in grasp.

As the wise Herb Brooks once said, "Great moments are made from great opportunities, and that's what you have here tonight."