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MIKE MODANO'S PLAYOFF DIARY - APRIL 21 Expectations, pressure add to intensity of playoffs 04/21/99 Mike Modano's diary, as told to Staff Writer Bill Nichols, will appear in The News during the playoffs. There's a lot of excitement to get the playoffs started. That's what we've all been waiting for since Vail, when we had our little players' meeting at training camp. We had a good talk, and we said then that we wanted to accomplish a lot of great things this year. We did that with the Presidents' and Jennings Trophies. Now it's a fresh start for everybody. There's a lot of excitement, some expectations, some nervousness, to get started. It's a special atmosphere in the dressing room. You'd like to think that it's just another game. But because of the pressure from the city and the expectations that the media's put on us, there's going to be some nervousness. There's going to be some butterflies, but that's good. If you don't feel that at this time of year, then something's really wrong with you. Once the puck drops, I think everything will fall into place. As a player, you feel different kinds of pressure. There's pressure on each one of us to really bring our "A" games, offensively and defensively. Everybody knows they have to take their game to another level. In the playoffs, there's a lot of sacrifice and mental preparation. I think mentally you've got to be a lot tougher. I think that's what it comes down to because you're involved in a lot of one-on-one situations. So mental toughness is the biggest thing in playoffs. If you have that and work hard at it, you can push the other team to the limit and come out doing the right things with the puck. This should be a great series. We really have to take Edmonton seriously because of what the Oilers did to us two years ago and to Colorado last year. It's going to be interesting because these are two teams that play totally different styles. Edmonton really relies on its speed to create turnovers, like ourselves, but I think we do it with more patience, using four lines. Edmonton's forwards rely on their defensemen to get the puck up to them, then they use their speed. Our job really is to take a lot of their neutral zone away, take away their middle ice. They've got some players who can really blow the game open, and they can burn you with their speed. Edmonton went through the season with some ups and downs, but the goal of every team is to get into the playoffs. They did that by playing great down the stretch. That takes a lot of commitment. For us, it seems the expectations are getting bigger and bigger each year. Everybody measures it by our regular season and the success we've had, and everybody thinks it just automatically happens in the playoffs. But anything can happen in the playoffs. Just look at what Edmonton has done the past couple of years. The Oilers find their game at the end of the season and surprise people.