I’m tired. I’m not getting enough sleep. Blame it on my Canadian pride.

I’ve always been an early riser. I just can’t seem to sleep much beyond 5 a.m. When I was doing morning radio, my alarm was set for 3:30, and I usually woke up before it went off.

Normally I compensate by going to bed earlier than many others do. Nine-thirty or ten o’clock gives me a full night’s rest. But I haven’t been managing early bedtimes recently.

In fact, I have been staying later than normal. Midnight has become common. All because I am cheering for the last Canadian team in the National Hockey League playoffs – the Edmonton Oilers.

The games start a little later than if Ottawa was playing, 8 p.m. Eastern. Which wouldn’t be a problem if they ended on time. But three of the four games played in the finals so far have gone to overtime. Sometimes more than one overtime period.

The Oilers and the Florida Panthers seem pretty evenly matched. They played against each other in last year’s final, with the series going the full seven games. Tonight is game five of the 2025 edition – and each team has won two games already. It is now a best of three, not a best of seven.

It has been 32 years since a Canadian team won the cup. Lots of Canadian players have lifted Lord Stanley’s mug in that time, but they have all played for teams based in American cities. Ottawa, Montreal, Edmonton and Vancouver have all fallen just short of victory. Toronto never comes close.

The new administration in Washington has done its best to destabilize Canada-USA relations, so for the average Canadian to have the Cup return north of the border would be especially sweet, kind of a sporting elbow in Donald Trump’s face.

So I will be watching tonight and cheering for the Oilers, who have become Canada’s team. My guess is that once again the game will go to overtime. I’ll be very tired Sunday morning.

But an Oilers win would make it worth it. And there’s only three more games, less than a week to go, and I can get back to my usual sleep patterns.