Tazer deftly maneuvered the puck through heavy traffic, around opponents, and faked out Preds’ goal-tender Dan Ellis who went low, as Tazer went to shoot upstairs.  Ellis tripped Toews but could not deter his shot up high as Toews went down. (And Stan and Rocky could sit there with a grin on their faces and say that’s why they now pay Tazer the big bucks.  Although, let’s face it, Toews from the beginning was always worth the big bucks.  He’s just now getting paid what he’s worth.)

Unfortunately in both goals scored by the Preds in the 1st and 2nd periods, the shots on Huet were screened by a Hawk. (Cam Barker for the first, and Niklas Hjalmarsson for the second.) I understand that defensemen need to back up their net-minders, but perhaps they should also learn to get out of the way. Things deteriorated in the 3rd period when the Preds scored two additional goals within seconds of each other.  The Preds took the Hawks, 4-1.

Honorable mentions in this game go to Niklas Hjalmarsson for a skillful block of an attempted wrap-around goal from the Preds (and some “hammer”-worthy hits); an easily shaken off hit on Troy Brouwer that was so hard it shook several panes of the glass (and probably Brouwer’s teeth); and a ghastly shot of the puck blocked by Brent Sopel’s knee, though he continued to play through the pain while limp-skating.

On a happy note, I love the power-play unit combination of Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, and Marian Hossa.  I think once these guys gel together, it will improve the PP-unit’s percentages.

Hey there, love following your stuff!

What are your thoughts on how the Hawks are gonna keep Hjalmarsson around after this year?  He is my fav player, just got his name/# on my jersey this fall.  I live in Rockford and got to watch him mature as an Icehog :)  But at the end of this year he is a restricted free agent I believe, and right now is only making $600,000/yr.  That ain’t gonna cut it for someone who Stan Bowman calls one of the top 4 defensemen in the league.  How we gonna keep him?  And where would you say he ranks in the opinion of the front office compared to the other restricted (or non) free agents on the team at the end of this season?  I would say he needs to be their #1 priority, ahead of Ladd, Eager, Fraser, Skille, Niemi, etc.

Cant wait to hear your thoughts! Thanks!

Thanks Cakes for the letter and for the kind words of praise.  I always appreciate hearing from passionate hockey fans.

Like you, Niklas Hjalmarsson is my favorite player, hands down.  Like me I bet you saw Hjalmarsson was going to be something special when we saw him in the playoffs last year. (In your case, you probably saw he was going to be something special in Rockford.) Not only should Hjalmarsson be the Hawks’ #1 priority but the defense in general needs to be their #1 priority.  I said this last season and was pleased when at the beginning of this season we saw a much improved ‘D’, so hopefully that means they’re working on it.  They just need to unload some underperformers and make some cap space.  Duncan Keith, Brent Seabrook, and Hjalmarsson have a lot of ice time because they’re having to make up for those who aren’t performing well like Cam Barker and Brent Sopel, and you just can’t do that forever.  Really, how many games in a row can you expect Duncan Keith to play over 28 minutes?  That’s nearly half the game!

And I’m certain that Hjalmarsson was paired with Brian Campbell because Campbell is that lousy and it takes the energy of a kid like Hjalmarsson to compensate for Campbell’s lousy performance. (You saw Campbell whiff on a near wide-open net in that Hawks/Ducks game last week, right?  And you’ve seen how often he turns the puck over, right?)  Hopefully the Hawks are not in denial of that and are scouting more Hjalmarsson-like d-men as we speak.  And for the love of God, why are the Hawks not considering unloading Brian Campbell?  If you’re looking to make room, that’s where you’d look!  Doesn’t that kind of deserve a resounding “duh” from Hawks fans?

To answer your question, I think the way the Hawks keep Hjalmarsson at the end of this year is to unload some excess baggage (sorry Soupy) and sign him to one of their decade-long contracts.  Hjalmarsson being so young and fielding other offers may or may not bite on that, but hey, in the NHL security is everything right?  So, to beat the cap hopefully that’s what they’ll try to do.  The Hawks can’t hype Hjalmarsson all season, calling him “The Hammer” and like you said, saying he’s one of the top four d-men, and then low-ball him.  The Hawks can also no longer ignore the problem with the defense if they want the cup.  So, yeah, they’re going to have to pony up and spend just as much energy, time, and money on their d-men as they have their forwards.

I love hearing from all of you, so please keep those cards and letters coming!

This time of year always makes me itchy for a couple of reasons.  One, because I hate talking about human beings as if they were slabs of meat; commodities to be traded on the open market. The other reason is because inevitably the Hawks will end up getting rid of someone I have grown attached to.  For instance, last year about this time it was James Wisniewski.  Then over the summer it was Matt Walker, Martin Havlat, and Nikolai Khabibulin (in that order of care).

The Blackhawks spend a lot on marketing players — cute/funny promos, the ‘One Goal’ ads, and personal interest stories — until we are made to feel that we know them and that they are family of sorts.  Then they go and trade some of them and I guess we’re just supposed to forget them.  The weird thing is, they keep people they shouldn’t and let go of those that were fundamental to the team.  For instance, I know I keep harping on the Matt Walker thing, but it’s important that the Hawks and the fans in general understand why it was such a mistake to let him go.  Matt Walker represented that heavy ‘D’ that the Blackhawks so desperately needed last year; the kind of ‘D’ that I thought they were trying to cultivate.  The pairing of Matt Walker with Niklas Hjalmarsson during the playoffs was brilliant.  Those two were instrumental in the Hawks getting as far as they did against some very tough teams. And yet, when the season ended Walker was quietly sent packing.  I honestly don’t know that his loss even sent a ripple through the sports pages, but I can tell you this girl had her guts ripped out on that one.  I started to wonder if I had only imagined Walker there; if I had been the only one to see how instrumental he was to the Hawks’ playoff success.

Now here we are again with the trade deadline looming and what do I hear?  That Kris Versteeg should be dangled as bait for a good d-man trade.  Well, if the Hawks had held on to Matt Walker, they wouldn’t need another Niklas Hjalmarsson-type d-man now would they?  Better yet, had the Hawks unloaded Brian Campbell like other fans and myself begged them to do over the summer, we wouldn’t be in this predicament.  But again, instead of looking to dump Campbell, they’re trying to get rid of Cam Barker.

Ok, I understand that.  Barker hasn’t been doing so well, but he’s been doing much better than Brian Campbell.  Campbell has always been a disappointment.  He had what 45 assists last year?  Well, I guess when all you can do is pass from the blue line, yes, you’re going to have that many “assists,” but how much of a help was he really?  It doesn’t mean you’re any good though, especially when you turn over the puck constantly, can’t hit, can’t block shots, and can’t take hits.  So I think most fans would agree he takes up way too much cap space.  And while I normally wouldn’t lobby for a player to go, in Brian Campbell’s case I will make an exception.  Why?  Because he doesn’t even appear to be trying, and I just can’t respect that.  At this point, he’s just collecting a paycheck.  Yes, this time of year the Hawks’ management has to make some tough decisions.  Whether or not to keep Brian Campbell is not one of them.

Also, on a goal scored by Cam Barker in the opening minutes of the third period (on which Colin Fraser assisted) Barker made a sweet deke, as did Patrick Sharp in the 3rd round of the OT shootout for the game winner.  You know, there isn’t a lot of mention of the deke, but I think if the Blackhawks employed it more, they might fake out the opposing goal tender for more goals.  Just a thought.

And poor Kris Versteeg.  What a bad night he had.  He just couldn’t get a break.  Steegy got handed two weird penalties — one for slashing, though we all thought it was goal-tender interference, which also would’ve been a bogus call, and one for actual goal-tender interference.  Neither of the penalties was deserved, or even actual.  Meanwhile, the refs were missing hooking calls like hooking didn’t even exist.  Geesh, why can’t the NHL hold a conference on bad refereeing?  Seems just as important a topic as fighting or so-called “dirty” hits.

And blast!  I keep forgetting to write a post about Dave Bolland’s back surgery.  Bolly will be out 3-4 months.  Get well Dave, take lots of pain killers, and get back soon!

Indeed, look how conspicuous some of these underperformers are when Jonathan Toews is off the ice.  For instance, Brian Campbell has always been a bumbler (at least with the Hawks), but how much more so now that Tazer isn’t there to pick up  the slack of his teammates’ bad passes, turnovers, and other bumblings?  How much more apparent is Dustin Byfuglien’s bad skating when on an opponent’s breakaway, big, bumbling Buff is left in the dust, which, in last night’s loss to the Avalanche at least, resulted in an avoidable goal.

And Ben Eager.  Well, clearly we haven’t been giving this boy his due.  In Eager’s absence is Colin Fraser seriously expected to act as enforcer???  I give Fraser snaps for trying, but please Ben Eager, eat your spinach, take your vitamins, and get back soon! (Or better yet, let’s travel back in time and re-sign Matt Walker who was an excellent, if uncredited, enforcer.)

Additionally, and as Sassone alluded to — Jordan Hendry, John Madden, Andrew Ebbett, Tomas Kopecky, and Jake Dowell — ain’t cuttin’ it.  The only newbie I see hustling out there is Niklas Hjalmarsson.  He’s so busy, he’s running circles, literally, around other defensemen like Brian Campbell and Cam Barker.  The Hammer is going to hammer himself out if he doesn’t get some help out there, and soon!

And the power-play unit.  Just the mere mention of it makes my stomach turn.  While the Hawks scored once on the power play last night, I think it is obvious even to the most casual hockey fan that there needs to be some vast improvement there.

The Hawks have had a fairly light schedule so far.  So does anyone really see them staying atop the division if they continue on like this?  Everyone knows the boys from Rockford are hungrier because they don’t have cushy multi-million dollar contracts to fall back on.  It’s play well or get out.  So, bringing up some eager beavers from Rockford might wake some of these Hawks up and make them realize their jobs aren’t guaranteed.

It was like both teams had taken Ambien and were sleep walking through the game.  They were slow.  I mean, slooooooow.  You can’t really blame the Hawks.  Why expend more energy than you have to to beat such a lousy team? And the Wild are lousy, at least on the road.  Even Patrick Kane was able to score a goal in the 3rd period, unassisted at that. (Other goals were scored for the Hawks by Dave Bolland and Troy Brouwer, both in the 1st period.)

Watching for the bad calls was the only thing keeping the crowd lively.  At times you could hear a pin drop in the UC.  It was eerily quiet.  Even the fight between the Wild’s Shane Hnidy and the Hawks’ Jake Dowell in the 1st period was blah.  No sooner had they gotten going at each other and the refs were breaking it up (which elicited a resounding, collective boo from Hawks fans), even though neither Hnidy or Dowell had put the other on the ice. And for that little go-around, Hnidy and Dowell got a 5-minute major penalty!  Similarly, in the 2nd period, the ref would independently call boarding on both the Wild’s Cal Clutterbuck and the Hawks’ Tomas Kopecky; both were minor penalties which indicated the hits were no big deal and certainly not severe enough to necessitate a boarding call.  If you blinked, you would have missed it.  I love it when refs try to phase out fighting or what they deem questionable hits by excessively penalizing them.  Yeah, because we don’t know what they’re doing.  Tonight’s game illustrates, at least in one way, why fighting in hockey is necessary.  It picks up an otherwise dreary game.  (And mad props go to the Hawks’ penalty-kill unit tonight.  They were mighty busy.)

Other of tonight’s calls that left us all scratching our heads came in the 3rd period when the Wild’s Benoit Pouliot was called for diving and the Hawks’ Cam Barker was called for interference. Even the scoreboard keeper was confused at those “penalties.”  The scoreboard at first called Cam Barker’s “interference” as “roughing.”  Hey, the statisticians’ guesses were as good as ours because we didn’t see Benoit Pouliot embellishing and we sure as hell didn’t see Cam Barker interfere. We did see Pouliot tripping, which came on the heels of another missed tripping call that should’ve been on the Wild, but how a ref could get diving out of that I don’t know. Perhaps the weirdest call of the night, at least against the Wild, was on goaltender Niklas Backstrom who was called for slashing in the 2nd period. <shrug>  It was about this time that the fans started realizing that the refs were just pulling calls out of their cracks…or they were smoking crack.  Something having to do with a whole lot of crack.

Overall, it was a weird game.  The refs must have been high and the players were in a funk, but the fans were in rare form.  Indeed, many wore their old Martin Havlat sweaters as if to say thank you to Havi for last season.  One fan even pointed to the ‘24′ on his Havlat sweater when he made it on the jumbotron.  That’s what’s great about Hawks fans.  Unlike other fans from other teams, we honor our former players.

Final score: Hawks win 3-1 against the Wild in a very strange game.

Hjalmarsson has helped to ease the loss of one of my favorite d-men from last season.  It was hard to see Walker leave, and in his absence Cam Barker just seems naked out there.  But Hjalmarsson has helped to fill the void.  And apparently Hjalmy picked up a trick or two from Walker: like how to defend the net.  When Huet was inexplicably absent from the crease, Hjalmy was there, risking a major penalty and defending the net with a swing of the stick on the encroaching Tucker that was more reminiscent of the MLB than the NHL.  Seriously, this season, for my money, Hjalmarsson is the kid to watch.  (I’m also curious to see how Jack Skille will do.  I think he will come along nicely given the chance.)

Beyond Huet’s gaffes (You know the word gaffe dontcha Huet?  It’s French for faux pas.), the lousy puck handling and bad passes last night, which led to all those turnovers, were cringe-worthy.  But the officiating, if you could call it that, didn’t help matters either.  Even Pat Foley had to comment on the lousy job the refs were doing.  Still, what was with the circus out there?  Was the ice not right?  Were their skates too sharp?  Was there a new puck provisioner?  Or were the Hawks just rusty?  Their ‘D’ is amped up compared to last season, which is such a wonderful thing to see, so hopefully they’ll work on puck possession and passing and reduce the amount of those turnovers.

Yes, and let’s talk about Huet.  When Baby Huey stinks up the crease, he makes me miss Patrick Lalime.  Yes, really, Patrick Lalime.  And unlike last season, I hope the powers-that-be don’t wait until well into the season to admit that Huet is hit-or-miss. (Another word for that is ‘unreliable.’)  Time to start talking about Antti Niemi, because if the Hawks stick with Huet, I just don’t see them making it past the regular season.  No way.  Riddle me this: had Niemi been in the net, would we have gone into overtime?  Well, okay, maybe the Hawks still would’ve ended up in OT, but would it have taken NINE shoot-out attempts to win the game? After the game was over, I kept hearing “nine times” in my head over and over like Principal Rooney says in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.  (And yes that was my way of working in an homage to our dearly-departed John Hughes, a Chicago institution who is sorely missed.  I’m convinced Mr. Hughes is in heaven trying to explain misunderstood teens and tweeners to God.)  Still, I was ecstatic to see Andrew Ladd get the glory for the final shoot-out goal and the win.  Laddy often flies under everyone’s radar, but he is consistent and reliable and therefore deserves a little recognition.

Colin Fraser is often overlooked as well, which is why it was so gut-wrenching to see his goal get overturned.  Head up buddy.  Everyone took notice of that valiant effort to get that goal.  You’ll get ‘em next time.

Likewise, Kris Versteeg too, while certainly not overlooked, is finally getting his due this season.  No longer is he “the rookie,” nor are they even talking about the dreaded sophomore year (which just guarantees a jinx if  Patrick Kane is any indication).  With Steegy, they’re finally just talking about how good he is, that he’s maximizing his full potential, and that he’s found his stride.  Every team needs a Scrappy Doo, and even though Steegy took some serious hits last night, he got right back up and was like “Let me at ‘em”!  Bang on Verbeauty.

There’s so much to talk about strategically too.  They must have read my letter to Santa, because last season how often did I complain about the need for a center, a defenseman, or anyone, to stand in front of the opposing team’s net and screen shots?  Nice to see Dustin Byfuglien has found his purpose in life. (Oh but please for the love of God Buff, don’t pick out your own clothes anymore!  For the sake of all that is good and holy, let a woman pick out your red carpet threads from now on since the only thing that red suit was missing was a pair of devil horns!)

And while I’m doling out the shame-on-yous, if the PR people for the Hawks are reading this, stop introducing the Hawks as “Patrick Kane and the Hawks.”  Nobody buys that and it’s embarrassing…for you.  Try “Jonathan Toews and the Hawks” or “Dave Bolland and the Hawks.”  Anything but “Kane and the Hawks.”  We know.  He needs some good PR after his recent arrest but Chicagoans aren’t that stupid.  So why don’t you just  push Kaner to do more charity work.  Although I will give a nod to Kaner’s handlers.  Seems someone sat him down and had a little chat with Mr. Rock-You-Like-a-Hurri-Kane.  Admittedly his play is much improved.  He’s taking more shots because he’s actually able to take it to the net.  Now if he could just land a few more, folks could believe again that he’s the hockey player his people keep propagandizing that he is.  I do feel sorry for Kane, because last season he was more of a PR/media creation rather than an actual hockey player.  But now, he seems to be hunkering down and finding his own way.  For his sake, let’s hope he can keep it up.  What a difference 10 pounds of meat and an attitude adjustment can make huh?

And I saved the best for last.  How awesome was it to see ‘Tony O’ Esposito, Stan Mikita (Oh how I wish Stan Mikita’s Munchables really existed), and the Golden Jet himself, Bobby Hull, back on the ice again!?  Won’t be seeing that again til heaven.  And it was a little bit of heaven just to see that last night.  Hopefully they can bring some good karma back to the Blackhawks organization.  Here’s hoping for a good season everyone!

P.S.  Missing Ben Eager and Adam Burish.  Get well soon boys!

The fans apparently picked Martin Havlat as the best forward:

Martin Havlat (55%)
Jonathan Toews (25%)
Patrick Kane (11%)
Patrick Sharp (9%)

Really?  Not Jonathan Toews???  REALLY?  I love Martin Havlat, don’t get me wrong. (In fact he’s my favorite player to Tweet on Twitter.)  He’s a great forward, no doubt about it, but shouldn’t Tazer’s youth and his added captain duties combined with point totals that are comparable to the highest scorers kind of tip him over?  If you’re going strictly on points, Havlat had 77 points including 29 goals and 48 assists.  Tazer had 34 goals and 35 assists for a total 69 points.  But Tazer was AWESOME this season as captain.  He was there for almost every fight, sticking up for teammates, and even giving up goals to lesser players when he had the better vantage point.  This is what I mean when I say that you can’t go strictly on stats.  Sometimes the things that aren’t measured by statistics — like sacrificing yourself for your team — are more important, and Tazer this season illustrates that perfectly.

Fans also got it wrong with the best defensemen category:

Duncan Keith (53%)
Brent Seabrook (37%)
Brian Campbell (6%)
Cam Barker (3%)
Matt Walker (1%)

I don’t think anyone can argue against Dunc or Seabrook for the top two, but Matt Walker as last???  This is especially baffling since Cam Barker is next-to-last though his +/- rating was -6 compared to Walker’s +7.  I guess fans just don’t understand the nuances of the game.  It appears that once again all they look at are goal points and assists.  It is a huge mistake to only look at defensemen offensively. (And doesn’t their position name, defenseman, kind of bear that out?) Yes, Dunc with his 8 goals, 36 assists, and +/- rating of 33 is stellar.  And yes, I would agree that he is probably the best all-around defenseman.  But what about defense???  What about blocked shots?  What about penalty kills?  What about hits?  So, you see how looking strictly at offensive stats only tells one side of the story?  And that’s why I so loved the Matt Walker/Cam Barker defensemen pairing this season.  On a team that puts more emphasis on offense, they were the much-needed defense, and they were golden at it. (What, nobody remembers all those big hits Matt Walker delivered??)

Gee, I’m kind of scared of what the results will be in coming days for the play of the year, MVP, etc.!

Where oh where has the Hawks’ backcheck gone?  Hockey pundits continue to talk about forechecking, forechecking, forechecking, but you can so clearly see that the Hawks did not do as good a job defending their own net.  If the Red Wings return at some point to their usual caliber of hockey — which is so aggressive on ‘D’ at times as to be goonish — then the Hawks are in for an ordeal.

Also why did Q put Niklas Hjalmarsson on the PK unit with Matt Walker?  Don’t get me wrong, I have liked Hjalmarsson a lot in the playoffs.  He’s really come along in the post season, especially considering how late he joined the Hawks, but is he ready to be on the PK?  Wouldn’t your most defensive defensemen — Cam Barker and Matt Walker, in my opinion — be a better pairing?  And this game again shows how when Q mixes up the lines — defensive or offensive — that it just mucks up the works.

Wow, what a frenetic brand of hockey we saw today!  Some of that was because of a stepped-up game on both the Hawks’ and Red Wings’ parts; stepped-up in terms of speed and the level of activity.  Some was because of the bumbling (including multiple turnovers and repeatedly leaving the puck) of some of the Hawks like Brent Seabrook and Duncan Keith (who also could have avoided those 1st-period penalties).  Seabs and Dunc even tripped over each other at one point early on in the 2nd period.  Looked like they got their cues crossed repeatedly throughout the game.  And there was other bumbling and sloppiness.  For instance, Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane were off their game, a rarity to be sure (at least for Tazer).

We can also thank the Lord above that Adam Burish did not get his carotid artery sliced open by the wayward skate of Ben Eager who went flying through the air in a check that went awry in the tail end of the 2nd period.  (Hope you’ve had your tetanus shot Bur!  Your mother must have been freaking out!)  As it was, Bur’s neck was covered in blood.  That’s just too close for comfort.  Gotta be careful with those skates.  They’re as sharp as Adam Burish’s wit!

Well, what can you say about a game like this one? Let’s just hope it was opening-series jitters that caused the Hawks to lose to the Red Wings 5-2 and that the Hawks don’t continue to get psyched out by the supposed formidability of the Red Wings.

Cam Barker’s 2nd period bad pass to…who? Dave Bolland?…hard to say… got picked off by Olli Jokinen for the goal.  Barker would redeem himself with his goal scored on Kipper in the last 4 minutes of the 2nd.

But Verbeauty’s PP goal in the last 7 minutes of the 2nd period was a thing of…well…beauty.  Clearly Steegy is earning his Calder nom.  And Verbeauty had the assist (as did Pahlsson) on the game-tying goal in the last 40 seconds of the 2nd when Dustin Byfuglien scored.  Way to go boys!  What an effort!

Still, the Hawks would fade in the 3rd period.  Patrick Kane was checked hard for the puck in the final minute of the game, which allowed the turnover that would score the empty-netter to end the game, 6-4 in the final.