$3 We’ve Worked Too Hard For Our Illusions Just To Throw Them All Away $3 The Committed Indian The REal Fan’s Program secondcityhockey.com April 8th, 2009 [email protected] 99 POINTS AND A BITCH AIN’T ONE Well, doesn’t all that teeth-gnashing Vancouver. But a lot of that pounding came it himself. The Blue Jackets don’t get any in March seem a little silly now? Don’t worry, as the Sedins ran wild against Bolland’s line. scoring from their blueline -- Hitchcock might we’re not gloating, we were right there with Well, Pahlsson has already drank the Sedins’ think hockey works like lacrosse, where your you. But after last night’s solid effort, and the milkshake once in the playoffs, we think he d-men can’t cross the red line. Their power Canucks win over Calgary, the Hawks need can do it again. Should he do so, the Hawks play is beyond woeful, so they’ve had to scrap two points out of the last six on offer to host can easily match the Canucks in secondary and claw for every goal, and it’s usually Nash Game 1 next week. Also, never in our wildest scoring. But time will tell. doing the scoring. Still, he got knocked on his dreams in September did we think the Hawks Masters Week, Jackets Everywhere ass twice by T.J. Oshie, so it’s hard to take him could top 100 points, which they have every To tonight, and the visit of the that seriously. chance of doing now. Sure, 100 points these panting-to-the-finish-line and banged-up Helping out a little have been the two days doesn’t mean quite as much as it once Columbus Blue Jackets. After a scorch- midseason additions, old friend Jason Williams did, thanks to Gary Bettman’s soccer-mom- ing stretch in March -- winning six of seven and Antoine Vermette. Both are averaging pleasing-everyone-gets-a-trophy points -- the Jackets are slowing down and having just slightly under a point-per-game. After policy. But it sure looks cool, doesn’t it? pieces starting to fall off. If the season were staring out flaming like he was on Halsted St., The Hawks have managed four stellar two weeks longer, they’d look like Elmer Fudd Vermette has cooled to five points in his last defensive efforts in a row, despite including driving with nothing but a steering wheel and 10 games. With their injuries, this is about all Matt Walker in some of them. It’s hearten- seat after Bugs has pulled the pin causing it to the BJs have in attack. ing to see that whatever game the Hawks are fall apart. They’re short an important d-man You know the drill here. Though required to play, they can do it. When you’re in Rostislav Klesla -- perhaps searching for they don’t score much, the defensemen of path in the playoffs could require you to grind Tuomo Ruutu’s knees -- and have taken a Columbus do what is in the name, defend. it out with Vancouver, then shoot it out with huge hit in their scoring with the absences of Mike Commodore and the criminally underrat- San Jose or Scum, the Hawks shouldn’t be too Fredrik Modin and Kristian Huselius. This was ed Jan Hejda make life for forwards hellish in worried about shifting through the gears. after future-stud Derick Brassard was lost for a way only prisoners can understand, and you One Toke Over Two Lines, Sweet the year trying to beat the shit out of James know Hitch will have landmines in the neutral Jesus Neal of Dallas (Derick, if you’re going to injure zone tonight as the Jackets chase the few points they need to shore up a playoff spot. During this last little streak, the yourself fighting a Star, make it a Star worth It’ll be another glass-chewing, goiter-ugly, Hawks can look at two lines, at opposite ends it. Ott, Ribeiro, Madano, Robidas, there’s so taffy-pull of a game. If the Hawks continue of the ice. We never used to be comfortable many to choose from). to be as solid in their own zone as they have with Havlat playing with Daydream Nation Still, the Blue Jackets are going to been, it will once again only require Mason to (that would be #19 and #88, for those who have to fuck up in Blagojevich-proportions to turn his head in disappointment once or twice, don’t speak our language), but these past few miss their first playoff berth. For that, they and those two games against Scum will be games that line has been weaving some sort can thank Steve Mason (more on him inside) academic. -Gordon Brown of black magic up and down our spine. At and Rick Nash, who’s pretty much had to do times it looks like a Globetrotter routine, and we think Pat Foley might have a brian bubble. In the four games they’ve been permanently together, they’ve put up 16 points. Perhaps it bunches the Hawks scoring just a little too much, but you’d be shocked if they’re broken up anytime soon. On the other side of the ice...actu- ally, it’s been on both ends, is the play of Ladd-Pahlsson-Buff. They’re +8 in the last four games, and have been chipping in with goals as well. Sure, the only extremely hot line they’ve cancelled out was St. Louis’s Kids Line, but they haven’t given Nash of Columbus or Nashville’s top line a sniff when they’ve been out there against them. Obviously, Buff can count, as he must’ve figured out when Sharp and Brouwer both got healthy it was his ass that could very well be planted next to Sassone and Ziehm. Maybe it’s that he isn’t asked to score now, only check, but whatever it is, we have to admit he’s played awfully well the past few games. We know a lot of Hawks fans are still trembling at the idea of a first round date with “He’s day-to-day with a lower body injury” FROM THE EDITOR Perhaps I made too much of it, but I felt a certain chill at the I can’t even describe the giddiness I feel that I will be at the UC when the final horn on Friday. Judging by the wall of noise that greeted it, I’m sure next Hawks Era officially arrives. Game 1 will signal that all that garbage I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. When the “2009 Stanley Cup and misery we’ve slogged through lo these many years is over. It will join Playoffs” graphic flashed across the United Center all of the other playoff memories that I have from scoreboard, my heart jumped, for just a second. The my childhood. Savard’s goal against Edmonton waiting was over, and no more would I have to sit and (yes, I was four, but I remember the radio call); the watch the 1st round and wonder when it would be our heartbreaker-loss to Minnesota in 1991, probably the turn. best team we had; JR starting the roll to the Finals in And Lord, has it been a wait. Seven years, St. Louis; Dirk Graham pounding home a dump-in and for some like myself, it’s been even longer. I off the boards in Detroit to put the Hawks up 2-0, and didn’t live in the country the last time the Hawks made the Brent Sutter finishing them off two games later; the postseason, and from all reports it didn’t sound like the 1992 Finals Game 1, which I’ve still never gotten I missed much. So my last playoff experience with over; JR’s overtime winner against Toronto in 1994, the Hawks was 1997, and their 1st round tolchocking the win over those same Leafs a year later in Game by the Avs. Sure, the Hawks battled back to get that 7, where I ditched a class outing in DC so I could series to 2-2, but when Colorado decided they’d had Sam Fels watch it (lots of detention for that one); Joe Murphy enough, they did away with the Hawks pretty easily. tying the game with less than a minute to go in Game The year before is the only playoff game I’ve 6 in that ‘96 series vs. Colorado, and him leaping into attended, which is a status that will change next Wednesday or Thursday. Gary Suter’s arms just as I leapt into my brother’s. And then the trash can It was Game 6 in the second round vs. those same Avs. That was Jeremy I knocked over on my way out after that game. And those are the ones that Roenick’s last game, and the last game of a Hawks’ Era. They haven’t been are just off the top of my head. May there be many more this spring. the same since. When Sandis Ozolinsh banged home a rebound in the 2nd overtime that night, it’s probably as close as I’ve ever felt (and hopefully -We’ll have a note in Sunday’s issue about this as well, but due to our will ever feel) to being shot. That Hawks team wasn’t young, it was clear printer’s closing on Easter, we have to print out Sunday’s issue on Friday.