It's time once again for Erin's Optimistic Takes, which will take a different approach tonight. The Department of Silver Linings missed most of the first 30 minutes of the game and hasn't had a chance to watch it yet. So after praising Kulak and Suzuki for their goals...

...which were important!--the Department would like to say something new.

Tonight, a team with two very young centers at the 1 and 2 spots, a team missing Danault, Gallagher, Byron, Drouin, and Price, a team playing its 4th game in 6 nights, our team, our Habs...

...held a much more rested, much more intact Toronto Maple Leafs team, the leader in the division, scoreless for the entire first period and roughly half of the second.

There were three quick strikes. Our 2-0 lead vanished. But the Habs, this depleted and still-weary...

...version of the Habs, did not stop skating, give up, or hand the Leafs an easy victory.

Because it was obvious in the third period that the Leafs caught the scent of blood in the water and went for it. They wanted a 5-2 win. They wanted the Habs to suffer a crushing...

...defeat, as a team led tonight by a 21 and 20-year-old might, in the Leafs' minds, have expected to suffer against a team like theirs.

They did not want 3-2, or several Habs firing would-be tying shots at Jack Campbell in the literal last seconds of the game. They...

...expected their win to be more comfortable, more clear, more heavily dependent on their goal-scoring prowess.

The Habs didn't give them that.

You might shrug and say it doesn't matter, that a win is a win, etc. That's not false. But (all doom and gloom aside)...

...these two teams are likely to meet soon under very different conditions. Playoff conditions. With several of the injured key players back. With as much as a week's rest and practice time.

What we saw tonight should make every Habs fan optimistic. The future is...

...coming for this team, faster than we know. The pieces exist now (when all are healthy) for the Montreal Canadiens to ice a team that combines the best of veteran experience, young talent, and skill across the board. The Habs are on their way.

There are still problems...

...to solve, skills to hone, lineups to improve and solidify. There are Habs from the coach down to the two youngest who have work to do to learn and grow. But when the biggest problem your team faces is that it needs time--well, each second that ticks by brings you...

...closer to that as-yet unwritten date when Habs fans will wake up, whisper "25!" and realize with incredulous joy that it wasn't a dream.

Till next time.