Hawks playoff push is on!
January 21st, 2008 by FrankWith Saturday night’s 2-1 win in Phoenix, their 4th in a row, the Blackhawks find themselves back in the race in the tight Western Conference. The 38 save performance by Patrick Lalime who has been just what the doctor ordered, was they key to keeping the hawks streak alive.
Lalime has had the hot hand and Denis Savard has said he is going to stick with the hot hand and rightfully so. Khabibulin hit a rut, and the move to Lalime should have happened sooner, but with the way he’s playing now it’s going to be tough to get him out of the lineup except for maybe back to back games.
It also seems as though Patrick Kane has found the scoring touch again, which is a relief. As it happens with many youngsters, the rigours of playing in the NHL in your first year can take their toll, not just from the amount of games, but there is also the travel, the speed of the game and the pressure of being in a playoff race. Not to mention being a number one draft pick and all the hype that comes with that. So it is good to see “Kandy Kane” back on track.
With 34 games left in the season the Hawks are going to have to win about 23 of them to give them 96 points. They also need to jump over some teams and hope that a couple teams have their own struggle. I believe that they are better than Nashville, and that Phoenix can’t keep up their inspired play, but they are going to have to count on someone else falling off the pace, and I’m not sure who that’s going to be. Colorado is faced with some injuries, Columbus, you just can’t predict what they will do, and as far as Minnesota or Vancouver, they aren’t going down easily, so the Hawks must keep the pressure on, and do thier best to win not only their division games but the conference games as well.
The excitement on Madison avenue is long overdue and a welcome site for sure. A trade or two could be in the future, but the better they play, the better the bargainning chips for the Hawks will be. If I was Tallon, I would be very careful not to make a move just to make a move. If some experienced player with playoff experience is out there and is available for the right price, then yes go get him. But don’t give up the future for just a few games.
Thanks for reading.
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One Response to “Hawks playoff push is on!”
By jstainer on Jan 21, 2008
Kane is going to need to keep up his scoring pace as fellow rookie Backstrom just put up another 4 points tonight, giving him 8 in the past 2 games!