The Price Was Right Hawks Lose 2-1 in OT

The best thing about tonight's game was probably the amazing play by both goalies. One got the win, but each goal given up was a good shot and good attempt at a save. Crawford went back to his hometown in this game, and was not treated as a hometowner would expect. He shrugged that off and played his ass off. I was very impressed with him in this game. It seemed like every few minutes I was tweeting a tweet that had the hashtag #CRAWESOME in it. That's always a good sign.

For the past few games, he has been the only guy stepping it up and that needs to change. When your goalie is the only player who decides to play you aren't going to win. Most good goalies can't make that many saves, so don't expect it. The Blackhawks need to learn from this rookie and learn from his work ethic and the way he always plays 110%. My favorite thing about tonight's game was that Turco had another heart to heart, goalie to goalie talk with Crawford. I don't know how he does it. If I was a professional hockey player that was sitting on the bench, I could not be mature enough to coach the rookie who took my place. I admire Turco so much for the way he has stepped up and helped Corey out.

The worst part of tonight's game was another injury. Brouwer went down in the 3rd period with a bad shoulder. I don't know the details, but I do know that we can't afford to have any more injuries. Sharp will be skating soon, but if we make the playoffs he probably won't be back for the first playoff game. If we make the playoffs these injuries need to end. We can't make a run at keeping the cup without Sharpie.



The only Blackhawks goal scorer was Patrick Kane. In doing so, he got his 300th career point. This is extremely impressive because it was done in only 314 games. Statistically that means that he only went 14 games without a point, literally he probably went more because he has had 18 multipoint games. Kane is an impressive player. He got cold through the middle of the season and I think people forgot that he is one of our best players. He has been the hot guy lately and has had a point in each of the last 8 games. (That's if my stats are right) Kaner is being the leader of the team right now. I heard that Toews was mad in the locker room after the game and that might lead to another win streak, but until the Hawks play again Kane is still the hot guy.

This game unfortunately and fortunately went to overtime. This was good and bad. I didn't want the Hawks to lose so overtime would have not been necessary if we didn't play like idiots during power plays. I like that we went to overtime because we still got a point. It's better than losing and not getting any credit even though your goalie and a few players played really well.

The Blackhawks started the game as if they had urgency, but did not continue to play that way throughout the game. Their energy trickled and led to them losing this game. They need to play a full 60 minutes of full on urgent lose you go home hockey. This team can win games if they all pull together and actually play well. I think Toews will get a goal the next game, and I think Kaner continues his awesomeness. Just for fun, I'll predict that Johnny gets an Ovechtrick.

Shutout, Hawks Win 4-0

This game was the first game of our new forward Marcus Kruger who we called up for this game. He played well, he had his first penalty but overall had a good performance. I think he will do a lot of good things in the future and look forward to seeing him play more with the Blackhawks. This game was a first game for someone else too, this is the first game for Campbell after his ankle injury and he seemed to skate just fine. Sharp was still out today, but the Hawks didn't need him, because they scored pretty well by themselves.

In the second period, it was still tied 0-0 when Toews passed to Keith who passed to Seabrook who rocketed it towards the net and got the first goal of the game. Toews had another assist on the stalberg score in the 3rd Period. Also in the third period Kane scored on a sweet pass by Keith. Both Toews and Kane had multipoint games, this was Toews' 24th and Kane's 18th. Later in the 3rd the three slovs were together and teamed up to score an awesome goal. Frolik and Hossa got the assists and Kopecky got the goal.

The biggest story of the night in my opinion was that Corey Crawford was amazing. I can't even count how many times I tweeted something with #Crawesome in it. He was a beast and ending up holding on to get a shutout, his 5th of the season. He has been in net night after night and is still performing like that, I think we have a winner here with him.
The big problem of the game, at least in the first part of the game, was that there was terrible passing by the Blackhawks. They had plenty of chances that were killed because certain players couldn't pass the puck well. They have to improve on that, but later in the game the passes were the things that shined, so maybe Q mentioned it during intermission.
The three stars of the night were crawford, toews, and the number one star was seabrook because his goal opened up the shooting spree and helped lead the Hawks to victory. All three stars deserved it and they all played extremely well.
Overall the Blackhawks played a good game and played like they needed to win, which they did. Toews was a monster as always, and Kane got another goal. I don't think I could be any happier right now about this game.

Blackhawks Struggles

I was planning on posting this basic post about four days ago, when the Blackhawks were making me very mad and they were not playing well at all. Now they won last night and they won earlier today, against pretty good teams, but not great teams. This is a step in the right direction, but we still need a lot more wins and not to lose a couple days after a win. There is something in hockey called a winning streak. Apparently the players don't understand what that is this year. The Blackhawks players can't seem to get it in their head that just because they won last year doesn't mean that they will automatically be in the playoffs this year. It doesn't work that way. They have to play like they want it, they have to play like it is last year. I have a feeling that Johnaton Toews' speech pumped up this team in a major way, no matter what he said. If we get a 10 game winning streak starting with these two games I would not be surprised. People say that Toews is not a good leader for our team. They must be kidding. He was the reason we won the game today and he is the reason we win many games. Just because he isn't a bitch like Crosby and doesn't have a big personality like Ovechkin doesn't mean that he isn't a good leader. He is a big leader for our team and a lot of the players on this team say that.
Back to the Blackhawks struggles. One of the reasons I think they are having a bad year is the beginning. They are a young team. I am as old as Patrick Kane. I know if I won the Stanley Cup the next year I might not play as well; I would feel invincible. I think that is what happened to a lot of these players. They won and therefore thought that nobody could ever beat them now. That caused the beginning of the season to be not such a great start and now we are in a tough situation as we get into playoff push mode.
Another reason for the slow start and not great season is that we have had a lot of injuries. Kane has been injured once for a long time. Toews was out for a little while. Hossa has been out for a lot of this year. Those guys were the first line last year. If you expect a team to win a lot of their games with those guys gone at points, you are crazy and have very high expectations. I knew from the point when they all got injured that this wasn't going to be a fabulous year. You can't blame a team for that, and I know I sound like a Cubs fan pulling the injury excuse, but Kane, Toews, and Hossa??
I'm going to end on a positive note. My favorite player since 2008 when I started paying attention the blackhawks again is having a monster year. He is, obviously, Patrick Sharp. He has 30 goals and most of those were while the other big parts were injured. He stepped up in a big way this year. He knew that some of the better players were injured and the Blackhawks would have an even worse year if somebody didn't step up. He knew this and he stepped into that position and scored like crazy. @blinkfink182 even made a great photoshopped picture of him. Everyone reading this follow him on twitter at that name.

(visit blackhawksdl.com for more)
I think that picture sums it up well.