"The toughest players aren’t those who hit but those who are willing to be hit, to fight their way into open ice, to fight their way to the net, to fight expectation and disappointment to score the game-changing goal."
The best part is in the final portion - 'to fight expectation and disappointment'. In any discussion of toughness, perseverance, and grit, I feel these elements are commonly overlooked or excluded; I've always appreciated Dryden's acknowledgment of these most relevant obstacles, and his suggestion that they remain very real even if most of us pretend we are above such emotion.
