Blackhawks Leadership Should Be Credited for Series Comeback

Momentum is a crucial aspect of a sporting competition. The team or individual who has it can ride it to insurmountable heights, while those who do not can fall in the most painful of ways. In ice hockey, however, it is stronger and more important than most other sports, as it was shown in the seven-game Western Conference Semifinals series between the Chicago Blackhawks and Detroit Red Wings that ended last night.

Just a week ago, it looked as if the Blackhawks were toast. It is often said that the more one beats a team in the regular season, the harder it is to do so in the postseason. After having swept the Red Wings throughout the regular season, it looked like Chicago would fall victim to that after last Thursday’s 2-0 defeat in Detroit, which had put the Blackhawks in a 3-1 deficit in the series.

This meant Chicago would need to win three consecutive games to advance to the Western Conference Finals. It was the 12th time ever in which the Blackhawks found themselves in a similar position and they had lost those series each and every time.

This Chicago Blackhawks team, though, is a special team. This is still the same squad that opened the season with a record-breaking 21-0-3 mark and finished with the best record in the NHL. This is a team that knows how to succeed and proved it by winning three games in five days.

The most important aspect of this series victory, however, is how the Blackhawks were able to wrest momentum their way at different points throughout the last three games, at moments in which everything looked bleak and almost over. This was a demonstration of resilience, an attribute that is not built overnight and which trickles down from the very top to inspire everyone in a team. The main foundation for resilience is a winning attitude and lots of guts. It is in that aspect that the team’s leadership steps in.

It all starts with the head coach, Joel Quenneville. During the entire season, Coach Q has succeeded in having Chicago ready to play every night. Team captain Jonathan Toews is the driving force within the team and the one who is in charge of having every single man wearing the Blackhawks’ jersey ready to play the moment he steps on the ice. He himself has had his clutch moments in the past, and this series was not an exception.

All one needs to do is look back to April 24, 2011 when Toews scored the game-winning overtime goal in Game 6 of that year’s Western Conference Quarterfinals to force a Game 7, after the Chicago had started the series in a 0-3 hole. While the Canucks went on to win Game 7, what the Blackhawks did in that series is nothing short of commendable.

One of the most important moments in this series, and which could have been a potential turning point and ended them earlier was the second intermission during Game 6. Chicago found itself losing 2-1 to the Red Wings and 20 minutes away from the end of its season and cementing its place in history as nothing more than a footnote and yet another Presidents’ Cup winner who failed to win the prized Stanley Cup.

It is impossible to know exactly what went on or what was said in the Blackhawks’ locker room during that recess, but it must have been something important. Chicago came out with a fire in its players’ eyes that had not been seen in a while. The Blackhawks quickly tied the game and proceeded to score two more goals to give themselves a comfortable lead halfway through the third.

The next crucial moment in the series happened late in that same frame. Detroit scored with 52 seconds left in the contest and having the extra skater, corralled Chicago in its own end. Backed by their rowdy fans and with momentum on their side, it looked almost inevitable that the Red Wings were going to tie the game and head to overtime on a high. The Blackhawks, however, blocked everything out and managed to hold on and take the hard-fought victory to send the series back home to the United Center.

The most important moment in the series, arguably, came with a little under two minutes remaining in last night’s game. At the 18:11 mark of the third period, it looked like Niklas Hjalmarsson had given Chicago a 2-1 lead, but the official blew the whistle as the play happened and called matching penalties on the Blackhawks’ Brandon Saad and the Red Wings’ Kyle Quincey. This action forced the game into an extra session for the first time in the series.

It was during this intermission that everything could have gone up in flames for Chicago. Just when it seemed as if the Blackhawks were finally going to walk away with the series, it was snatched right out of their grasp. Chicago could have very easily crumbled mentally, and thus allowed Detroit to take the game in overtime. Once again the spotlight must go towards the head coach and the rest of the Blackhawks’ leaders, not only Toews, but the others that are leaders in the locker room.

In the end, it was the strong leadership in the Chicago locker room and the team’s ability to get through adversity, which allowed the Blackhawks to mount this comeback. Chicago will need more of the same if it intends to get past the defending Stanley Cup champions and advance to its second Stanley Cup finals in four years.