Round One: Calgary @ Chicago

What an awful loss this would be for the Flames.

WOW...what a thriller...

This is the series we expected. The Flames are a fantastic opponent for the Blackhawks...couldn't be any closer.

:%%:

On to Chicago!

Looks like this one will be the first round series to watch. Many thought the Flyers series would provide the most entertainment but now that the Flyers are down 3 games to 1 its on to the Flames - Hawks.

Steve Rosenbloom provided a typically measured Chicago perspective in the Chicago Tribune this morning:

A big comeback, but the Blackhawks come back to Chicago tied

The Blackhawks needed a hero. Instead, the Flames found one. Eric Nystrom banged in a rebound of a Cory Sarich slap shot from the right point to put the Flames up 5-4 with about seven minutes remaining in the third period. Jarome Iginla would score into an empty net with 11 seconds to go, and suddenly this became a best-of-three playoff series. The Hawks had momentum. They should’ve taken the game. They should’ve won the third period. But apparently, it took too much out of the Hawks to come back from three goals down in the second. Perhaps an older team, a more veteran team, would’ve seized on their momentum and converted that power play early in the third period. But after Todd Bertuzzi slew-flooted Duncan Keith at 2:08 of the third period, the Hawks never got anything going and the Flames started taking control of the game. They started pushing the action with speed through the neutral zone. They forechecked hard to get the better scoring chances. They were far more dangerous than the Hawks, and Nystrom finally converted. You can only hope the Hawks learn from this. You can only hope they don’t duplicate the errors that gave the Flames three straight goals in the second period, starting early with Cam Barker’s egregious giveaway in his own zone that led to an Olli Jokinen goal that began the onslaught. You can only hope they give goalie Nikolai Khabibulin more help. You can only hope they find a hero of their own. Until Nystrom scored, this blog was going to begin like so: Goal, Dustin Byfuglien. Assist, Joel Quenneville. With 50 seconds to go in the second period, Jokinen was called for slashing. The Blackhawks were down 4-3 --- at one point it was 4-1 --- but now, incredibly, they had a chance to tie it and send the Flames turtling into the dressing room. So, with his team earning an incredibly important power play, Quenneville could be expected to send out his top unit, his scorers --- Jonathan Toews, Patrick Sharp, Martin Havlat. But no. Instead, the coach sent out Sammy Pahlsson, Kris Versteeg and Byfuglien. Third-liners or fourth-liners depending on who’s counting. Quenneville recognized which players were giving him great shifts, controlling the puck and creating chances. He rewarded them with ice time the way good coaches do. And Quenneville was rewarded when Byfuglien tipped in Brian Campbell’s shot to make it 4-all. When the Hawks fired Denis Savard four games into the season and brought in Quenneville, they envisioned just that kind of bench savvy. The coaching change was engineered by Hawks hockey guru Scotty Bowman, regarded as perhaps the best game coach ever. So, he knows when the guy behind the bench can adjust shift-to-shift. Bowman made the point at the Quenneville news conference that the new guy had what it takes to compete against the veteran coaches in the division. That extends to the playoffs, especially against a Bowman clone in Calgary’s Mike Keenan. Truth is, Quenneville met the moment about 10 minutes earlier, wisely using his timeout after Calgary made it 4-1. He tried to break the Flames’ momentum. He needed to calm his young, excitable team. Remind them there was a lot of time left, half the game. And the Hawks proceeded to get the next three goals in the period, capped by a big move on a big power play made by a coach’s coach. It would’ve been a nice story if the Hawks had won the third period they way they won the seond half of the second. Wasn’t to be. All the pregame talk of the physical play, the charges back and forth, the lobbying of the officials -- tell you what, Hawks-Flames ’09 recalls Bulls-Knicks ’91 (and ’92 and ’93). The Knicks didn’t have the talent the Bulls had, so they had to ugly up the game. Same goes for the Flames against the Hawks. The Flames aren’t as fast as the Hawks, so they’ve been trying to drag the Hawks down to their pace. Players who are looking over their shoulders lose their speed and control of the puck. Another question coming into the game was how the young Hawks would handle tasting their own blood. They rode the home crowd to two big wins. Then they missed an early chance to smother the Flames in Game 3. They created their own adversity and now they were forced to respond. And look who responded early. Patrick Kane converted a slick centering pass by Sharp, blasting a shot past Flames goalie Miikka Kiprusoff to give the Hawks an early 1-0 lead. Guess Kane got over the flu (or the toilet flushing of a pet goldfish) that kept him out of Game 3. Probably felt a lot better and without the harrassing of injured Flame Rene Bourque, too. But right after that, Toews committed a tripping penalty, giving the Flames a power play and a chance to get even and get the quiet crowd back to its standard mania. And that’s exactly what happened when Jarome Iginla snapped a puck past Khabibulin to tie it at 1. The Hawks held a precious lead for all of 67 seconds. It’s hard to get mad at Toews after the way Captain Kid has repsonded in the playoffs, but you can’t make lazy plays with your stick. You have to make strong, disciplined plays with your legs. Take solace, Hawks fans. The Flames have never won a series after losing the first two games. A couple years ago, the Flames lost the first two games to the Red Wings, then won the next two at home before losing Games 5 and 6. Hopefully, this looks familiar.

Andre Roy has been suspended one game.

Calgary is dead now!

http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=419768

Interesting.

Looks like the league really wanted to clamp down on the BS and get these guys focused on playing.

The game last night was EXCELLENT by the way...

It was awesome until I conked out.

504Heater wrote:It was awesome until I conked out.

Drink more espresso LOL

The Blackhawks need to remember who they are and where they come from Saturday night...and get the job done.



No excuses. Just win, baby.

PS I only expect excellence from this team. One reason, as pictured below:



Want to know how long it's been? Too damn long.

Let's Go, Blackhawks!

Stan Mikita was 21--same age as Jonathan Toews--when he helped the Hawks win the Stanley Cup. So no excuses about 'being young'.

And no complaining about rough play or late hits, or bad calls, or bla bla bla...

BTW Mikita again in this shot of Bill Gadsby trying to take his head off...Stan isn't any bigger than Patrick Kane.

Didn't stop Stan from being a Champion...and it shouldn't stop Kane.

Calgary at Chicago

9:00 PM ET, April 25, 2009
United Center, Chicago, Illinois

TSN/RIS
SERIES TIED 2-2

Flames-Blackhawks Preview

CHICAGO (AP) -- Adam Burish doesn't agree with those who say the Chicago Blackhawks are intimidated or cowering from the Calgary Flames' aggressive play.

"They had to play more physical and more tough and they did that," Chicago's rough right winger said Friday. "But it was nothing out of the ordinary."

After losing two tight games in Chicago, the Flames regrouped for a pair of victories on home ice at the Pengrowth Saddledome. Now comes a crucial Game 5 back at the United Center on Saturday night.

Since the Blackhawks are a younger team making the franchise's first playoff appearance in seven years, Calgary's approach has been to get tough to test the inexperienced Blackhawks for physical and mental weaknesses.

"People want to say because we're young, we don't know how to handle the physical play, but all our guys are still healthy and our guys feel pretty good," Burish said. "It's a non-issue."

Flames star Jarome Iginla said Friday that Calgary's physical play was, for one thing, a way to slow the Blackhawks down physically.

"We don't play as open or end-to-end," he said. "When we are having success, we need to play physical, aggressive and get in your face. ... When we've let up and let them skate, they can skate and make things happen. We got to stay on that body."

Burish broke a stick with a high check on the shoulder of the Flames' Renee Bourque -- his former Blackhawks and University of Wisconsin teammate -- at the end of a very "chippy" Game 3 that featured plenty of after-the-whistle confrontations and trash talking.

After the NHL told the teams before Game 4 it wanted to limit the extracurricular activities and the jabbering, there seemed to be less of it Wednesday night.

"You still have to challenge them," Burish said. "You can't give a guy like Jarome Iginla a free pass."

Burish said he and Bourque are still friends, despite the confrontation.

"What happens on the ice, that's it. Done. If he were to cross check me that way, I'd be ticked off as heck on the ice. I'd want to go after him, but once the game is on for me, that's my job, that's my business," Burish said. "We'll get together when we're back in Madison at some of our old hangouts."

Bourque missed the Flames' 6-4 victory in Game 4 after apparently aggravating an ankle injury in Game 3.

Calgary coach Mike Keenan wouldn't give an update on Bourque or Craig Conroy, who left Game 4 with an injury. He did say Daymond Langkow, injured late in Game 4 when he blocked a shot, was expected to play. All skated in practice Friday.

Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville doesn't plan to replace goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin with Cristobal Huet even though the Flames scored 10 goals in the two games in Calgary -- one an empty-netter.

Khabibulin has had success against the Flames and was in goal for Tampa Bay when it won the Stanley Cup against Calgary. Some sloppy defensive play by the Blackhawks has made his job even tougher.

"We need to be better and not give them point-blank shots they've had and take care of rebounds," Chicago defenseman Brian Campbell.

davetherave wrote:Stan isn't any bigger than Patrick Kane.

Didn't stop Stan from being a Champion...and it shouldn't stop Kane.

I can't profess to have watched much hockey from that time, but wouldn't you agree that players are quite a bit bigger nowadays?

I mean, Frank McGee won 4 Cups and scored 14 goals in one game for the Silver Seven, but at 5-6 would probably have a difficult time nowadays getting into the NHL at all.

asq2 wrote:

davetherave wrote:Stan isn't any bigger than Patrick Kane.

Didn't stop Stan from being a Champion...and it shouldn't stop Kane.

I can't profess to have watched much hockey from that time, but wouldn't you agree that players are quite a bit bigger nowadays?

I mean, Frank McGee won 4 Cups and scored 14 goals in one game for the Silver Seven, but at 5-6 would probably have a difficult time nowadays getting into the NHL at all.

It's not the size of the dog in the fight. It's the size of the fight in the dog.

^No disagreement there. But surely something has to be made of the increasing size of hockey players (and equipment).

Anyway, Kane should be fine, but I'm not sure I ever seem him physically laying waste to the opposition.

asq2 wrote:^No disagreement there. But surely something has to be made of the increasing size of hockey players (and equipment).

Anyway, Kane should be fine, but I'm not sure I ever seem him physically laying waste to the opposition.

Martin St Louis doesn't seem to have any issues in that respect.

And it's not about 'physically laying waste to the opposition'.

This is hockey, not UFC.

davetherave wrote:

asq2 wrote:^No disagreement there. But surely something has to be made of the increasing size of hockey players (and equipment).

Anyway, Kane should be fine, but I'm not sure I ever seem him physically laying waste to the opposition.

Martin St Louis doesn't seem to have any issues in that respect.

And it's not about 'physically laying waste to the opposition'.

This is hockey, not UFC.

Milan Lucic and a few others would disagree.

Obviously, it's not essential, but it can give you a leg up. I think that's partially why Ovechkin gets the respect he does: he won't only dominate the score-sheet, but he'll leave you limping by the end of the 2nd period.

That's only a hypothetical, though. It doesn't diminish Kane from who he is, just like the fact that Crosby doesn't have Ovechkin's shot.

He should be fine.