All You Can Do Is Laugh: Hawks End It Like It Started

 

The Chicago Blackhawks closed out the regular season with appropriately, yet another loss, this time to the Buffalo Sabres. The Sabres are a team that has hit rock bottom and is on the rise with a bright future with 2 number one (overall) draft picks in the lineup on defense. The Hawks are close to hitting rock bottom and a rebuild will be in the works for the next couple of seasons. The Hawks habit of not protecting leads came into play as they had one goal leads twice in the game with the Sabres tying the game both times before scoring the overtime winner. A frustrating season for Hawks fans that has finally come to an end and hopefully their fortunes take an upward turn next season. Fingers crossed!

Takeaways:

• I missed watching the game on Friday, so I had to resort to watching the replay on Saturday afternoon, which is okay because where I live it's solidly rained all day. I don't know what's wrong with NHL Live, but the stream froze with 40 seconds left in the third and when I switched to the Sabres broadcast it stopped with the exact time left in the game. What the hell! If I was watching this live I would have been going crazy! I couldn't access the overtime so I had to resort to the highlights on the NHL website. Disappointing finish!
• For whatever reason, the Hawks wore their home red jerseys and as usual there was a lot of red in the crowd. Despite a losing season, it was a good crowd in Buffalo.
• Speaking of, "for whatever reason", Sabres goalie (and former Blackhawk), Malcolm Subban sang the American anthem. Smiles from both teams, Subban did a commendable job, though he had a little trouble with some of the high notes and some other notes...😄 Well done Malcolm!

• Goals: Dominik Kubalik opened the scored about midway through the second period with his 15th goal of the season from a sneaky feed from Alex Vlasic for his 2nd point of the season. Dom's had rough season, but he's shown good compete level for the past month or so, maybe he can carry that into next year. Dylan Strome broke a 1-1 tie with a nice deflection about midway through the third with his 22nd. A good bounce back second half of the season for Dylan who has been a good fit with Kane and the Cat. Unfortunately, the lead didn't hold up with Owen Power tying it up to force OT about five minutes later.

• Quick notes: The Hawks resigned Sam Lafferty to two more seasons. Good move by the Hawks, it's an affordable deal for a player that has shown what a lot of hard work and hustle can do. He is the polar opposite of Alex Nylander the player they traded to acquire Laffy. Interestingly, the player they traded to get Nylander from the Sabres, Henri Jokiharju, who was a top Hawks prospect a couple of years ago, is now a solid top-4 D for Buffalo. Collin Delia played a good game, though Power's goal was stoppable. The future of Delia is as uncertain as the whole goaltending situation with the Hawks. It will be an interesting off-season.
• Patrick Kane finished the season with 93 points, his third highest total. For such a losing season, this really reflects the importance and reliance of scoring placed on Kane who had 14 more points than Alex DeBrincat. To put in perspective how top heavy the scoring is with the top line, the points drop with the next highest scorer after Kane/Cat/Strome and Seth Jones to Jonathan Toews with 37 points. Hard to imagine if the rebuild includes dealing some or all of these players. I cringe to think about it.

Up next: Well, the regular season is over for the Blackhawks and it'll be a time now to evaluate what went wrong. As a fan of the team I can only hope this "rebuild" will be quick and less painful than this season. We need some optimism and I really hope the team's management and ownership is in the right hands. What do I know, I don't even live in Chicago. The same could be said for my hometown, Winnipeg Jets who also are wrapping up a disappointing season. Unlike the Hawks, they have a solid core of players that just need a fine tune and add a couple key positions. The Hawks may have to tear it down!