The Line Blender was brought out of storage a little too quickly. Only the third line remained unaltered after the puck dropped for the second period and, while they provided some of The Hawks' most dominant shifts, they remain an incomplete unit to a large extent. For all his good qualities, Kruger is pretty limited offensively, while Hossa and Hartman are primarily finishers. If they're not able to get the puck to each other on a regular basis (and they haven't been) goals will be hard to come by.
On that tack, I don't recall what serious indiscretion Schmaltz committed to be relegated to spot duty for the last 40 minutes, but was Kero really the best choice to skate with Toews and Panik for the duration? Would it have been a bad idea to shoot Hoss in there, instead, as it's not like his trio was accomplishing much, despite their best efforts? I like Kero, and he puts forth a solid effort every night, but he's far from being a skilled player.
The Nashville goal was made possible to a large extent by the collision of Schmaltz and Panik, with Toews becoming slightly entangled there, as well. Is THAT what led to Schmaltz's banishment, 'cos he was the only one of those three Hawks forwards who had a Predator in his grasp? If that's the case then Coach Q and Co. need to look at the tape.
While Anisimov was better in his first game back than I expected his timing was all messed up, so it was unfortunate that he had the lion's share of chances that his line created.
Oduya struggled in all aspects; too slow and couldn't make a simple pass reliably. On the flip, Campbell had a good bounce-back effort after a few pretty indifferent games to close out the regular season, his only errors in judgement being involving TVR in his plans. Keith was fantastic, I thought, even if he made a couple of decisions late in the game that didn't pan out.
It's far from panic time. The Hawks could well have won this one; if the sticks start working and the lines begin gelling again we'll be just fine.
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