Just like last year, the Blackhawks find themselves on the brink of elimination against the Kings. A lot of internet folks and “experts” said that the Blackhawks were going to win this series. They win the first game. In the second, they dominated until late in the second period. Then, the wheels fell off. They lost that one. And the one after that. And the one after that also.
Just like last year at this time, I wish they would play the games on paper.
I’ll be the first to admit, that personally, I’ve been spoiled. Growing up with this team and watching them get tortured in the 90’s by teams like the Red Wings and Avalanche frustrated me. It was me loving players like Jeremy Roenick, Chris Chelios (asshole), Ed Belfour and later, Tony Amonte and Eric Daze. They didn’t win anything. I wasn’t happy but still, too young to be pissed off. Then, came the dreadful early to mid-2000’s. It was torture once again with bags of dicks such as Alexander Karpotsev, Jocelyn Thibault and Martin LaPointe.
The 2007-2008 season arrives and so does the demise of the old man himself, Bill Wirtz. Rocky takes over. Dale Tallon gives a eulogy speech at the home opener and gets booed by the crowd. Fast forward to 2010, here’s a Cup. Last year, have another. All of a sudden, people are saying that the Blackhawks are going to run the town like the Bulls did in the 90’s. That’s fine by me.
So here are the Blackhawks down 3-1 for the second year in a row. With the playoffs this year, comebacks aren’t rare. I said this in the previous series and I will say it again. If any team can make this type of comeback, it’s the Blackhawks. They’ve done it before. If they don’t want to face criticism about how high expectations were by losing all of these games because they couldn’t stay out of the penalty box, then they will win three in a row and advance to the Stanley Cup Final.
For the love of God, please win three in a row.