Beige: Sharks 96, Hawks 3

Hey, it could have been worse and, depending on what's going on with Corey Crawford, it might well be a lot worse.  No news on that front yet, so here are just a few notes on this unremarkable "effort".

If The Hawks Think They "let this one get away" they're kidding themselves, 'cos Martin Jones made them look good.  Three goals on four shots flatters to deceive, especially given that The Hawks recorded only one shot on net in the last six minutes of the first period.  
Not One Hawk Was Particularly Bad (okay, maybe Martinsen and possibly Seabrook, but stick with me) but only a few Hawks cobbled together more than a handful of shifts in which they played really well.  Strome was noticeable and Saad had some looks that were brushed aside but, aside from isolated incidents, The Hawks were just....meh.  Beige.
Special Teams Were Garbage.  The Sharks move the puck so quickly on the powerplay that The Hawks' PK units were just running around most of the time.  Meanwhile, our PP was rotten and I'm going to pin that mainly on Seabrook - he's simply too ponderous and too sloppy to get that job done, missing passes and taking forever to decide whether to shoot, pass or count the stickers on his SubWay Club Card.  He makes it dead easy to defend 'cos the bad guys know pretty much what he's going to do and, if I'm honest, he fucks it up half the time, anyway.
To be fair, I guess, that's on Colliton, too - he keeps trotting that goof out there.
Piss-Poor Defensive Coverage.  If not for The Hawks' D failing so badly they might have been able to stand on those three opportunistic goals but, after two games in which The Hawks' D had tightened things up considerably, they reverted back to mid-November form tonight. Keith was soft on Sorenson's goal, Murphy and Dahlstrom thereabouts but not covering anyone, really, on E. Kane's tally, Seabrook choosing to help screen Cam Ward instead of clearing Goodrow the hell out of there and Gustafsson standing idly by while Couture tips one in unopposed.  That's four of the seven goals against right there.

Anyway, it was a crap attempt at hockey tonight and the worst may yet be coming as we await word on Crow's condition.

Pistol Annies - Beige

Almost Got Away With It: Sharks 4, Hawks 3

After only showing up for the first period and overtime The Hawks really had no business thinking about a win tonight, but there they were, hanging in there and making The Sharks sweat a little.
At this point in this season it's the little things that give one hope.
Despite their hideous record this month The Hawks haven't often been kicked around in shots/ Corsi/ chances, but tonight was a night in which they were dominated and shoulda coulda lost badly.
Anton Forsberg, however, had other plans.  Yes, he allowed 3GA and, yes, he was a bit sloppy on E. Kane's goal, but he outplayed the bona fide NHL goalie at the other end and kept his team in it to the end.  Extra credit, too, given the number of A+ chances his teammates ceded to The Sharks.

But you all want to read about Victor Ejdsell, so let's get to that.

The big fella, obtained from NSH at the trade deadline, debuted after playing a mere two AHL games and, in all of 17 minutes, looked okay.
Not great, not terrible...okay.
The first thing you notice is his size: long & lanky, with a vast reach.  He doesn't seem especially quick but he's no slug, either.  Hands seem good and he got a few hard shots off rather quickly.  His positional play was hit-and-miss but, it's his first game, he was thrust onto the top line and played the point on the PP.   Someone might point out that he was on the ice for all three Sharks goals but, to be fair, two of those GA were down to 1) Seabrook turning the puck over (after Ejdsell had won the draw, BTW) and 2) Gustafsson being beaten twice along the boards in a single sequence.  He was clearly not comfortable on the left point on the PP and was a bit out of step during his shift in OT but, he was given a ton of responsibility for a guy playing his first NHL game so I'll not rake him over the coals just yet.
If Edjsell turns out to be A Thing, though, Anismov and/or Hayden had best brace themselves.

And hey, The Hawks allowed fewer than five goals in consecutive games.  That's progress.

Oops: Sharks 7, Hawks 2

That is all.

Approximately Good Enough: Hawks 2½, Sharks 1

Once again The Hawks defy logic.  After losing a lot of games in which they crushed the opposition in shots / attempts / chances, tonight they were outshot and just below break-even in possession, yet won the game.  Statistics are lies, I guess.
It was an untidy game for both sides but maybe a bit messier for The Sharks.  Neither team hit a pass in the Danger Zone™ in the entirety of the first period and, really, it didn't get a lot better later on.  Would it be damning The Hawks with faint praise if I said The Sharks wanted this less?
* All that aside, if Wingels could shoot or pass even a little bit The Hawks could have had this salted away a lot sooner.  He, Toews and Saad buzzed The Sharks zone all night yet came up empty when they could have used a crisp pass on the tape or a shot on net.  Please, Q, this is ridiculous.
* On that tack, Jurco lined up with Kane and Anisimov again.  Tonight he was muscled off the puck countless times, lost the handle on a couple of rushes and, somehow, missed an open net.  This choice is even more silly than Wingels playing on L1, because Jurco has yet to contribute anything to this team.  There are no past successes to suggest he belongs this high up the order.  He tries, I'll grant him that, but he accomplishes nothing.

* Even though he was probably only in the lineup because The Hawks are shopping him for trade day, Duclair had a fine game, his best as a Hawk.  He was on the move all night, had a strong forecheck going and was one of a very few Hawks forwards making a pass now and again.
* Rutta returned after missing eight games and was fine.  Better offensively than defensively but okay, overall.
* Oesterle was bad again.  Keith was refraining from giving him the puck deep in their own end because, I assume, he's well tired of having it weakly pushed back toward him a few seconds later when Oz is under pressure by a forechecker.  He's been better, it just seems like he's underthinking almost every aspect of his game right now.
* JF Berubé was good.  He didn't get that much work tonight but he did survive a handful of sustained attacks by The Sharks and a few goalmouth scrambles.  Now let's see him do it again.

Out-Everythinged Except Where it Counts: Hawks 4, Sharks 1

I'm tired & unwell, so this shall be short & sweet.
How peculiar it was that, as the game wore on and The Sharks carried the play more and more, The Hawks were the team doing the scoring?  Hey, it's been flip-flopped the other way more than a few times, so all's fair, right?
Goaltending was a huge part of these apparently disproportionate rewards: Scott Darling was nearly flawless while the usually steady Martin Jones turned in a bit of a stinker, granting The Hawks two rather soft goals.  The only puck to elude Darling, meanwhile, was threaded through a forest of eight-to-ten legs and deflected, for good measure.

Reunited and it Feels So Good: The Triple H Line were back in action and, while they were south of the border in terms of possession and gacked as many plays as they succeeded with, they were right there when they most needed to be.
After a couple of games in which didn't cause me heartburn TVR was a mess tonight.  I lost count of how many footraces he lost, so let's just say "all of them".  Was he always this slow, 'cos that was pathetic, tonight.
Once again, Toews - Kane - Panarin did whatever they pleased.  File that away, willya.

As above, maybe The Hawks win this without Scott Darling's steady hand, as Jones was really quite bad, but why the hell should they?  Tonight was a welcome return to form after a couple of patchy starts.

Same - Same: Sharks 2, Hawks 1

Yup, there were a lot of similarities between last night's loss in San Jose to the beatdown in Alberta a few nights earlier.  Practically all of The Hawks were north of 50 in possession and, in fact, at evens they all were.  Otherwise, the match felt fairly even and, if not for a goal that arose from a slightly ridiculous pair of...not even errors, more like decisions that just didn't pan out, The Hawks could have exited with one or two points.  Of course I'll mention a few things that went wrong!
The Winning Goal started with a clearing attempt that Seabrook, in retrospect, should not have gone all-in to try to corral, which led to Old No. 7 huffing and puffing after the much faster Joel Ward. Not to take anything away from Ward's goal, but Crow shoulda coulda had that one but, by his own admission, he hesitated and found himself in no-man's land by the time he finally committed. Ward's shot-fake wasn't even that devious.
Toews' Injury sure didn't help, with him being their one true all-situations forward.  His absence threw his line and both special teams into disarray for half of the game.  Coach Q reported this AM that The Captain is day-to-day and questionable for Friday.
Shot Selection was an issue, just as it was in Edmontonstone, although it was less of a block party than against The Oilers.  Martin Jones is a big fella who robs the bottom part of the net and is nearly impenetrable from the dots-in. The Hawks failed by not doing enough to make Jones move side-to-side, or were prevented from doing so a lot of the time.

Enough.  We'll try again on Friday.

Just One Thought: Hawks 4, Sharks 3

It seems to me that, when the best option you can come up with is to trot out Brandon Mashinter, who spent more time in the penalty box than he did on the ice, your team is going to have trouble with even a mediocre team like The Sharks.  The Hawks have had great success, lately, with four well defined lines but, with Mashinter in the lineup, you essentially take one of those lines out of play.

What is this, 1976?

Do You Want it Or Not?: Hawks 5, Sharks 2 and Wednesday's Big Boy

Right off, The Hawks played a good game on Wednesday.  Not great, but pretty good.  The Sharks weren't entirely terrible, but there were a few factors that kept them on the outside looking in.
- How did The Sharks reel off six road wins in a row when coach Peter deBoer is apparently unwilling to match lines even when at home and with last change?  I would have to dip into the archives to see what the nature of those six wins were but I'd hazard a guess that The Sharks were playing some fine hockey, 'cos their coach isn't doing them any favours.  Please note that when deBoer coached The Devils they were awful, and now they're not.  Hmmm...  What is with these Sharks coaches and their stubbornness?  It took Todd McLellan three years to realize that trotting out his top line against Toews always ended with his top trio getting pantsed.
- Martin Jones was not very good, dropping for everything and kinda just waving at the puck.
- The Sharks, as a group, appeared to be only intermittently interested in winning this game and, when they did get some momentum going, The Hawks were in lead-protection mode.  That's going to end in tears more often than not.
- Apart from having consistently spectacular facial hair, what is Mike Brown for?

                                                      Pistols at dawn, Flashman!
- In the last two games Ryan Garbutt has been alright.  Maybe not top line alright, but not a mess, entirely.  He did a few selfish things vs. Vancouver but that little flick pass to Toews last night was subtle and smart, qualities not heretofore part of Garbutt's oeuvre.
- Oh, Trevor Daley, could you consider actually hitting the net with a shot one of these days?
- Was Jonathan Toews in a funk because Duncan Keith was out of the lineup?  Could be a coincidence but, even though the team had a couple of shaky games since Keith's return from injury, Toews is getting ever closer to his usual form.  If there is any merit to this...I don't know why, exactly.  It would be something more subtle than I'm able to distinguish, at least right now.  I think the other defensemen are also doing a better job now that Keith is back and doing Keith things; now those other guys don't have to think that they should or can do the stuff Keith does.
Either that or ROZSIVAL.  Yeah, right.
- I kinda think that with Tanner Kero what we see now is pretty much what we're going to get, as in I don't see him progressing north of the third line on this club.  That said, what I see of Kero I don't mind at all.  Every team needs a couple of guys like Kero and he actually does it pretty well.  I guess having 4 or 5 guys doing that job (plus one that is trying but failing) is a little excessive, but that's not for now.  Kero's tip that just by chance hit Martin Jones was very good, very good indeed.  If he can keep that sort thing happening we may soon bid adieu to A. Shaw.

As mentioned above, this lad subjected us to several weeks of sub-par play, something that probably bugged him a lot more than it bugged Hawks fans.  Often, as Toews goes so go The Hawks, and that may well have been the effect of Toews and his linemates being outplayed most nights had it not been for the so-called second line carrying the mail so ably.  I don't know what was going on with Toews - it could just have been one of those deals where a few mistakes or bad bounces start to get on a player, and the stick is gripped a little tighter and it becomes really tough to do what normally comes naturally . And you know Toews was pissed off about it, what with him dropping the gloves twice in recent weeks, probably as much out of general frustration as anything. The good news is that Jonathan Toews isn't going to shrug and just let it happen (hi, Alex Semin!), and that's just one of the qualities that make him such a great player and leader.  May we resume our regular programming, now?

                                                            Welcome back, Cap'um.

Power Restored? Hawks 6, Sharks 2 and Saturday's Big Boy

See what happens when assets are properly managed?  Today's lineup, to my eye, included three strong lines and one good-enough line which, on most days, can beat anyone out there.  I also want to mention ice time; with only a few exceptions the minutes-played for each Hawks player seemed completely appropriate.  Richards, Teravainen and Sharp were above 15 minutes, Bickell played more than 9 minutes and Coach Quenneville resisted leaning too heavily on Shaw and Versteeg.  The exceptions?  Maybe Vermette deserved more time but, not being on either special team, he was probably just crowded out today.  Rozsival, sadly, saw his TOI jump back up to 19 minutes, but we can't get everything we want, can we?
The Good
- How nice to see Sharp get some bounces and probably a shot of confidence after a strong performance.  His intermission interview impressed me, as well, when he referred to his on-ice struggles and "that off-ice BS".  If I or any other Hawks fan is growing weary of all the Sharp rumours imagine how he feels.  His emotional tone suggested to me that Sharp still cares very much and that scoring in the first period (a what a beaut!) probably felt like a piano just slid off his back.  It also sounds as if his father is or has been unwell which cannot have been doing much for his concentration while that has been a concern.
- Corey Crawford continues to do all that is asked of him.
- I thought Keith was pretty good today.  He was efficient and kept it all rather simple, despite that 10 seconds of derring-do that so impressed Pat Foley.
- Teuvo Teravainen continues to show more poise and confidence which each passing game.
- The power play struck twice and, apart from one dodgy PP in which The Hawks failed to get anything going, looked competent with confident puck movement.  Andrew Shaw failed to make the scoresheet but was instrumental in two goals.
The Bad
- Precious little.  Rozsival had one nightmarish shift and a few isolated "yikes" moments, but otherwise I failed to notice him, which is as it should be.
The Ugly
- Andrew Desjardins cannot really skate, can he?  Oh well...

Two goals, his first in forever, and a determined effort all afternoon to drive to the net gets Sharpie The Belt today.

                                                  Now, don't get all misty on us.