Milbury said it straight out: Patrick Kane was ineffectual as center.  Kane’s face-off win percentage was probably 33% on average, and he got hammered and nailed upon most attempts to take the puck to the net.

Milbury concluded that Kane lacked depth as center, and observed that Kane was being yelled at by the coach on the bench for lack of production (not to mention the turnovers and/or giveaways).  So I have to ask: Will Patrick Kane’s tenure in Chicago soon be coming to an end?  Will the Chicago Blackhawks be floating him for a trade?  Just think what the Hawks could do with $5 million in extra cap space…hmmm….

Speaking of getting it right, the Hawks couldn’t in tonight’s shutout by the Avs. I don’t think we have ever seen Captain Serious, Jonathan Toews, so frustrated. In the dwindling moments of the game, Toews was slow to get up after having been knocked once again to the ice, and he just never seemed to recover his will. When the game was over, Toews uncharacteristically was one of the first off the ice to the dressing room, foregoing his usual fist bump to each of his teammates. I can only imagine what he had to say to his teammates once off the ice. Hopefully he angrily yelled at them and said something like, “I can’t carry an entire team by myself. So if you don’t have the heart to get out there and do your best and stop bumbling around with the puck, then what are you doing here???” Toews had every right to take a breeze on his team after the game was over; they took a breeze on him while the game was still on.

Last night’s 4-1 win against the Calgary Flames was conspicuous in regards to Patrick Kane for a few additional reasons.  First, it was very obvious that Patrick Sharp set Patrick Kane up for a very sweet goal in the third period.  Even Pat Foley noted that Patrick Sharp could just as easily have taken that shot himself, but he “unselfishly” passed off to Kane for the goal.  Was Patrick Sharp being “unselfish” really, or was he just doing what he had been instructed to do?  It’s no secret Patrick Kane has trouble taking the puck to the net.  It’s also no secret that Patrick Kane will give up the puck if harassed by opponents even slightly.  Heck, I’ve been writing about it for several seasons now.  In fact, much of this blog space has been taken up with my complaints about how Jonathan Toews shouldn’t have had to babysit Patrick Kane when Kane was on Toews’ line.  Not only was it ridiculous for Toews to have to prop up Kane, but I think Toews got tired of it too and may have asked for Kane to be put on a separate line…

…Which leads me to the second most conspicuous thing from last night’s Blackhawks-Flames game: After the game, Captain Jonathan Toews gave every one of the Blackhawks a fist bump coming off the ice except for Patrick Kane.  Subtle?  Yes.  Yet it speaks volumes.  So I’ll say it.  I think Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews may have had a falling out.  And all this fan can say is that I don’t blame Jonathan Toews one bit for being fed up as Patrick Kane’s babysitter.  I would also add that it is very apparent that Jonathan Toews is not happy on this team this season, and understandably so.

Jonathan Toews is a superstar, no doubt.  But as captain, you can so clearly see he puts his team first and himself second.  Toews could be a Sidney Crosby or an Alex Ovechkin and take all the glory for himself, but he is selfless and has instead taken a step back and has supported his teammates instead of becoming a glory hound.  Still, there are limits, and if Toews was asked to babysit Patrick Kane in order to make Kane look better (i.e. to carry Kane), well, that is absolutely unfair to Toews, captain or not.

Now I’m not trying to shrink heads here, but there is inarguably a team psychology to every team, and it looks like the Hawks have been psyched out all season.  They win, but can you really say that they’re clean wins or that the Hawks look like a cohesive unit?  And why don’t the Hawks salute the fans after home games anymore?  Why don’t Toews and Kane do fan signings together anymore, or at all?  Why are the Hawks doing less reaching out to the fans than they have in past seasons?  Something’s not right here, and the cracks are starting to show.

Related:

Hawks win on Halloween, but still some bats in the belfry

Where Toews and Kane cannot compare, however, is on the face-off.  Patrick Kane is still struggling on the face-off with only 1 face-off win and 6 face-off losses and a mere 14% face-off win percentage in tonight’s game; whereas Toews had 20 face-off wins and 5 face-off losses for a face-off win percentage of 80%.  So maybe these two can trade up on some things.  Maybe Toews can step up his game and Kane can step up his face-off wins.

And what to say about the Hawks’ lagging power play?  Last year, their power play topped the league and their penalty kill was lagging.  Now it’s the opposite with their penalty kill topping the league and their power play bottoming out amongst the lowest in the league.  It’s embarrassing for the Hawks to repeatedly not be able to score on a 5-on-3, but of course the Hawks are aware of this and are certainly working on the problem.

Overall, the Hawks need to buck up against defensive-minded teams.  The Hawks looked tired and sloppy tonight.  Dave Bolland’s line wasn’t as aggressive as before; Viktor Stalberg, while shooter on the game-winning goal, didn’t pick up his game ’til the overtime period; and even Jonathan Toews was slow to get off the ice at one point.  Let’s hope the Hawks are just suffering from something unavoidable like the flu and will clear out the cobwebs and pick up their game soon.  Still, a win is a win.  Happy Hawks-o-ween everybody!

However, in pre-season play it has been delightful to watch Brandon Pirri’s rising star.  This kid is amazing!  He almost had a hat trick in last night’s loss to the Penguins.  And while the guy in the Hawaiian shirt at the bar where I was watching the game disagreed with me, the call on Pirri for “interference” in the last minute or so of the game was in error.  Unless I missed something, it looked like Pirri was just following through with a check on the boards, though it was difficult, judging from the camera angle, to see where the puck had gone.  What wasn’t hard to miss was Pirri on the ground, on his back, getting his ears boxed by, it looked like Pens’ Zybnek Michalek.  Still, it looks like Pirri will go far.  Apparently opponents think so too or Pirri wouldn’t have become an early target.   So bang on Pirri.  You’ll get that hat trick yet! 

And speaking of pummelings, how in the hell could Red Wings’ coach Mike Babcock defend that nasty hit to the head from Wings’ defenseman Brendan Smith on Hawks’ winger Ben Smith during the September 28th pre-season game???  Babcock called Brendan Smith’s resulting suspension “extreme.”  Really Babcock?  Extreme?  You know what’s extreme is when you get your bell rung so hard that you can’t move, have no idea where you are, and need a trainer and your teammates to help you off the ice!  Babcock’s comments really shocked me.  Normally he is pretty level-headed about such things, but not this time.

You can clearly see from the video that Brendan Smith intended to throw a shoulder as his elbow was flailing out well after the hit. (In other words, the shoulder and elbow were going and there was momentum there well after the hit.):

It clearly wasn’t an accident and the NHL was more than justified in suspending Brendan Smith for the remainder of the pre-season and for 5 games of the regular season.  Well done NHL, and rule 48.1 concerning ‘illegal checks to the head’ will be a good one if applied and enforced properly.

What additionally concerns me is that the refs weren’t calling many of these goony hits during the Sept. 28 Hawks/Red Wings game.  I saw lots of elbows and shoulders being thrown and spearing well before the hit on Ben Smith, so part of the blame for Ben Smith’s injury must lie with the officiating.  Too many missed calls.  Oh but the refs didn’t miss a beat in sending Brent Seabrook to the box for a five-minute major for “fighting” when Seabrook was just trying to defend Ben Smith.  Really?  That’s what constitutes fighting now?  I didn’t even see Seabs throw a punch!  Third-man-in rule maybe, but if you call a major, it better be…well…major.

And sorry Brendan Smith.  I don’t buy your aw-shucks routine, your apology to Ben Smith, or your lame explanation that you were “never targeting his head.”  Perhaps the minor leagues will teach you about playing respectable hockey.  Shame on Mike Babcock too.  There is no defending that kind of hit, though it’s not unexpected from the Red Wings, one of the gooniest teams in hockey. (They used to be THE gooniest team in hockey ’til the Canucks started giving them a run for their money.)  Still, the Hawks got the ultimate revenge by winning over the Red Wings, 4-3, a win that was clearly for Ben Smith.

And speaking of injuries, it is unfortunate to lose Viktor Stalberg to a knee injury before the season has even started.  We eagerly anticipate his return of course; the Hawks need and clearly miss his grit, though Michael Frolik exhibits a fair amount of grittiness too.

Grit is something the defensemen have needed the past few seasons too, and it looks like the Hawks have beefed up by pairing Niklas Hjalmarsson with Brent Seabrook and Duncan Keith with Nick Leddy.  I love these pairings and hope they continue.  I also love that Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews are on separate lines.  These two may work well together on special teams, but Jonathan Toews can excel much more without having to constantly set Kaner up for sweet goals.  I also don’t think Patrick Kane is effective as a center, but time will bear that out I’m sure.

Also on kind of a sad note, I was sorry to see Marty Turco go after last season.  I thought maybe he had another season in him with the Hawks if for no other reason than to impart some of his veteran moves to the up-and-comers, but if he had to be on his way, so be it.  Corey Crawford is coming along nicely, though I still miss Antti Niemi. And, hopefully it is not in doubt that Alexander Salak should be back-up net-minder.  Ray Emery just doesn’t have what it takes, at least, not yet.

All-in-all it looks like the kids are alright.

In tonight’s game 5, it looked like Dustin Byfuglien agreed when during a check of Flyers’ d-man Kimmo Timonen at about the 10 or 11 minute mark of the 3rd period, he took out Dan O’Halloran as well.  Two goons with one hit.  It was a thing of beauty!  O’Halloran seemed to know that hit was meant for him too by the look on his face.  Karma can be tricky Danny boy.  The hockey gods don’t seem to like your intentional missed calls on the Flyers.

Finally, just to add insult to injury, Hawks’ Dustin Byfuglien scored the last goal of the 7-4 victory over the Flyers with an empty-netter in the last minute-and-a-half of the game with Dan O’Halloran having to rule it a good goal.  So sweet.  Go Hawks!  Get that cup!

P.S. Hats off to Q for taking Big Buff and Kaner off the first line and moving Marian Hossa and Tomas Kopecky up with Toews.  It totally threw off the Flyers.  They couldn’t put the bullseye on any one player and with Buff checking up and down like a mad man, it was discombobulating to the Flyers.  Hopefully Niklas Hjalmarsson can figure his game out by game 6 though, because we need him blocking shots.  Don’t know what’s up with him, but he has that deer-in-headlights look about him.

Also of note was a Vancouver newspaper that made sport [See page 1, yes page 1 (!), of the preceding link] of Patrick Kane’s incident with a Buffalo, New York, cab driver last summer.  I don’t mind anyone criticizing Patrick Kane for that incident,  I have certainly added my two cents, but what is conspicuous about the Vancouver paper poking fun at Kane is that they chose playoff time to do it, which is just sort of lame.  That was so last summer Vancouver.  You should’ve commented on it then.  Doing it during the Hawks/Canucks series just comes off as sour grapes.  Once again, real classy Vancouver!

And last, but certainly not least, is the goon hockey played by the Canucks in this series.  I guess that shouldn’t surprise us.  But what is chuckle-worthy is the whining of Roberto Luongo about how the Blackhawks are supposedly engaging in goon hockey!  Wayne Gretzky last year held the trophy for the whiningest individual in hockey, but even Luongo could give “The Great One” a run for his money in this series!

Last season I used to argue against Dustin Byfuglien’s face washing and harassment of Roberto Luongo during Hawks/Canucks games.  My criticism came mostly from the fact that the Hawks would have to penalty-kill an avoidable goal tender interference call.  That and winning a hockey game because of gooniness isn’t winning the game based on expertise, but rather because of what a team can get away with.  So if the Canucks are going to engage in goon hockey (which they regularly do) then I think it only fair that the Hawks answer with a little bit of gooniness themselves.  And in this series, keeping pressure on the net and on Luongo, has certainly been one of the greatest keys to the Hawks’ success.  So why should Luongo expect a classier version of play than his own team engages in?  And why should he expect an opposing team to change his diapers?  Just because your save percentage has gone below .900 doesn’t mean you get to be a crybaby.  So to Roberto Luongo I say: WAH!  Tell it to your mama.

As for the overall play in this series so far, I’m surprised there haven’t been more scuffles.  What, no dirty hits, cheap shots, or jerseying from Kevin Bieksa?  What, no hair pulling from Alex Burrows?  What, no reason for Ben Eager and Dustin Byfuglien to beat the stuffing out of you two?  Bummer.  Well, there’s always next season!

And hats off to Dustin Byfuglien and Jonathan Toews for their hat tricks in this series!  Victory is the best revenge.  Yes, who wouldn’t prefer a couple of hat tricks (or even a Gordie Howe hat trick) to just a donnybrook?  It also shows you what Jonathan Toews is capable of when he doesn’t have to babysit Patrick Kane at every turn.  As Red Wings coach Mike Babcock told The Hockey News, “to me the guy you build the franchise around is the Toews kid…He’s a will machine. He just keeps coming and keeps coming…”  And that’s why he has more points in the Stanley Cup Playoffs than any other. (Yes, even more than leading NHL scorer Henrik Sedin!…Nelson Muntz finger point and “Ha! Ha!”)

And finally, there is a little bit of vindication for Huet haters (or Huet dislikers) like myself.   Some have been afraid of the backlash and so haven’t been vocal about the Hawks needing a new net minder, but the sentiment was still there.  I’m just sorry the Hawks wasted so much of this season trying to beat a dead horse.  Lots of fans knew that given a chance, Antti Niemi would rise to the challenge and be a great net minder.  I’m just grateful the Hawks organization figured that out in time for the playoffs.  Sorry baby Huey.  I think your tenure in Chicago may be over.

So, da be, da be, da be, that’s all folks… at least for now.  But remember Canuckleheads…stay classy!

P.S.  Oh yeah, and stop calling Byfuglien “Buffy.”

There was a little bit of a to-do in the 1st period with Penguins’ Matt Cook and Hawks’ Duncan Keith.  Matt Cook delivered a tough hit on one end and then at the other end Duncan Keith elbowed Cook in the face.  Keith got a 2-minute interference call, though it could’ve been a 5-minute major or even an ejection. (Cook would later pay Dunc back with some knuckles to Dunc’s jaw which laid him out on his knees.)  Seconds later, Marian Hossa scored a stunning goal off of some agile passing from Patrick Kane and Brian Campbell. (Yes, Brian Campbell!)

Then the Pens’ Evgeni Malkin went at Colin Fraser in the dwindling minutes of the 2nd.  Geno had Fraser on his back on the ice and still the ref didn’t intervene.  I’m all for a good scrap, but I think you can call off the dogs when you’ve got a guy on his back!

Evgeni Malkin struck again in the last minute and a half of the 3rd period with a pass to Jordan Staal who put it past Antti Niemi for a goal after the Pens had pulled Marc-André Fleury from the net.  Still, the Hawks would battle back in the overtime period with Kris Versteeg hammering the puck past Fleury for the win.

Truthfully I was a little surprised that Hawks’ secondary goalie Antti Niemi was put in net against Pens’ Marc-André Fleury.  I thought maybe it would’ve been wiser to put Niemi in last night’s game against the Predators and put Cristobal Huet in net against the defending champion Penguins tonight.  But Niemi proved me and other doubters wrong.  He held the Penguins scoreless through two, almost three, periods.

All-in-all, an amazing game.  The kind you DVR and watch over and over if only to watch the Penguins eat it.

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.

Following are comments by Keith, Toews, and Kane, as well as highlights from the Q&A session:

Duncan Keith:

“I was drafted by this team when I was 18 years old.  [Playing my whole career here is] what I envisioned when I was first drafted…”

Patrick Kane:

“Once I came to Chicago and played here I couldn’t imagine playing anywhere else.”

Q&A:

Q: Do you think you’ll feel more pressure with your new contracts?

Toews: “It’s part of the game…for us it doesn’t change anything.”

Q: Dunc, when it came up that the deal was going to be 13 years were you shocked?

Keith: “I can’t say how happy I am to sign for a long-term deal like that.  It says a lot about what the team thinks of me as a player.  13 years is a long time.  I believe in this team…I believe that we’ll win a championship one day.”

Q: Can you talk about how hard it was for the organization to pull this off with the cap?

Kane: “As players we don’t think about that much…but for the organization to get this done at this time…it says a lot about Rocky and Stan and the organization.”

Q: Does this raise the pressure to win the Stanley Cup soon?

Toews: “There’s always going to be some ups and downs…at the end of the day you gotta believe you got every guy in your locker room needed to win…Our first goal is to get to the playoffs and then we go from there…”

Q: Do you have an appreciation for how good you have it right now?

Toews: “There’s no way we can express our thanks…I still feel like a young kid, living the dream and playing in the NHL.  To be blessed to live in this city I can’t think of any better place to be drafted to at 18 years old…As far as the fans go, and this city, and the atmosphere we get to play in every day, it’s incredible…”

Q: Do you follow the other teams and do you know that you’re the most successful team in the city?

Toews: “[Chicago] is a great sports city…I’m like everybody else and I just enjoy watching these teams play.”

Keith: “I was here in the first couple of years after the lockout…it’s amazing to see the turnaround…and to see where we’re headed in the future.”