By Gabe LacquesUSA TODAYARLINGTON, Texas — For six consecutive years now, the Los Angeles Dodgers have stared into baseball’s abyss, the winner-take-all playoff game, a contest that brought them heroes and heartbreak in almost equal measure, but never ended with the club recording the final out of the season, inciting a merry dogpile. Sunday night, on a balmy and wind-swept evening at Globe Life Field, the Dodgers confronted so many of their past demons in Game 7 of the National League Championship Series, and above all an Atlanta Braves team that pushed them to the brink of elimination by winning three of the first four games. Yet this is widely regarded as the greatest of the Dodgers’ eight consecutive division champions, buttressed by the acquisition of Mookie Betts, galvanized by an infusion of young pitching, but always wondering if something was missing from the franchise still searching for its first World Series title since 1988. Well, in a taut and wildly entertaining Game 7, the Dodgers showed a fortitude they either developed or perhaps always possessed, only to get swallowed in October’s whims.Read more on NewsOK.com