The elevator door opened and John Carver emerged with a look on his face that could stop time.

Figuratively, it actually had stopped; for it was halftime between Toronto FC and Houston Dynamo and the banished-from-the-touchline Carver was on his way to find out why his team had lost interest in playing the game for the second straight game.

"I'll tell you what, if you all had been flies on the wall at halftime it would have been interesting because the paint was stripping off," Carver said during his post-game conference. "It is probably the most violent and animated I have ever been because I was disappointed."

The stage was set for Carver carnage that everyone in attendance -- flies included -- would be privy to hear. But it didn't turn out. Instead, what happened from when I first saw Carver in the elevator to when I last saw him in the conference room changed everything.

"That is the real Toronto FC … what I saw in the second half. That is the side I have been preparing to put on the field," Carver said, confused and happy at the same time. "And it is so disappointing that I am seeing it in the second half and not in the first."

Unlike every game dating back to the June 14 win over Colorado it was actually enjoyable to watch TFC play in the second half of Saturday's matinee.

I even scribbled a reminder on my coffee-stained pad after Greg Sutton collected a corner kick late in the game and Amado Guevara made a voluntary 60-yard run waving his arms for his goalkeeper to deliver him the ball.

Finally, the real TFC had stood up … with four games to play in the season

Why? Why now, with four games left in a season full of wasted opportunity has urgency arrived?

Here's the answer:

Remember back in April when Carver warned the world against complacency? Well, it seeped in. The coach -- in his plight to avoid the c-word -- was unintentionally being undermined by the efforts of everyone else around him.

"They won't get what they get here at other clubs," Carver said when asked about the motivation to do well in Toronto. "Ask the guys who have come from other clubs recently, experienced players like Ruiz. Ask him what it is like in here compared to other clubs."

Ring a bell, Leaf fans?

"They won't get looked after they way we look after them. They won't get the coaching and the technical work like we do. They won't get the medical treatment and the physical aspect like we do."

It seems complacentitis struck TFC from the inside, known to make victims both hideous and handsome at the same time.

Now playing with purpose when the outcome can affect your livelihood is not unusual in any professional sport in the latter stages of its respective season. But it is different when the source might be the high-praise players, coaches, etc. heap on Toronto for being a first-class organization.

The challenge is to instill uncertainty while still running an organization capable of attracting players.

But how? The answer to that question is as clear as mud, but a serious message can be sent when the season ends and Carver, along with Mo Johnston, must name only 11 players to protect.

Last season Chris Pozniak felt the sting. Imagine if a name like Jim Brennan or Guevara is left off this time around? Both players without question deserve to be here, but the names that are left off that list of 11 will undoubtedly fight to never be placed in that situation again.

"What you have to realize is that I want people who want to win and fight and die for the cause. Respect what you've got. Appreciate what you've got and start putting something back into it for the people who have settled this organization."

Carver has laid down the professional gauntlet, and Saturday in New York supporters will see just who picks it up.