Blackhawks 4, Coyotes 1
United Center
Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2009
Just as the White Sox used certain clubhouse gags in order to get out of their hitting slump last year, the Blackhawks Adam Burish picked up a little help at the joke store on the way in Wednesday against Buffalo.
“Now that it’s all over, I’ll say this,” said the Hawks winger. “We began the game with exploding pucks; we ended with a couple that fell out of Lalime’s jersey. ‘Nuff said.”
Bandwagon fans are a sensitive bunch, investing emotion in a dense spectacle over the course of a season. As young players who are just starting to believe in themselves, Blackhawks jokesters like Burish seem to know this.
Games like the Blackhawks game last Thursday in Colorado — where both opposing goals seem against the few rules I (and Patrick Sharp) have caught on to — make me punch the wall and wish for either ignorance or more knowledge (normally I’d punch something soft like the couch, but this is hockey).
Then on Saturday I furtively flipped channels late in the third period to see if the Bulls were doing any good and saw this: THUNDER 109, BULLS 98.
(Is the Thunder even an NBA team? Because they sound like either one of those sad franchises that plays the Harlem Globetrotters or the 35-and-over team down at the Y.)
Why did the Blackhawks play so sluggish for a few games there? Was a curse catching up with them after visiting Wrigley? Did Detroit teach the rest of the league a lesson on the Hawks as well? Does all-star fever lead to partial blindness, or worse, Devin Hester syndrome (second-guessing the second-guesses)? Perhaps, after a super-long political season, the team is tired of people making promises they can’t keep and will stop spoiling us with nine-goal games.
On Wednesday Patrick Sharp and Jonathan Toews were both credited with goals that certainly seemed covered by the former Blackhawks goalie Patrick Lalime, only to fall out of his equipment and over the line.
By the time Martin Havlat scored in the second, Lalime wasn’t even worried about the puck in front of him until Havlat had put it behind him.
Hey, whatever works. Personally, I’d say the bandwagon play of the game was Matt Walker making a snow angel on the ice while blocking a Sabres scoring attempt. Hilarious.
Bandwagon question of the game
Anybody else notice that after Duncan Keith took a hard hit in the second, the entire Hawks team started playing absolutely brutal hockey? Looks like they learned something from Detroit as well.
Up next for the Blackhawks
Rangers. Friday. 7:30 p.m.
