Chicago- The 2010-2011 President’s trophy winning Vancouver Canucks seemed poised to pull off the sweep of the defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks when they jumped out to an early three games to none series lead. Three times in the history of the NHL playoffs has a team come back from three games down to win a series (’45 Maple Leafs, ’75 Islanders, and last year the Flyers), but Chicago is surely making a strong case to become the fourth.
On the verge of being swept out of the Stanley Cup playoffs the Hawks responded well with a 7-2 victory in game four, and a 5-0 victory in game five cutting the series lead to 3-2 in favor of Vancouver.
An alarming sign for Vancouver fans had to be seeing their all-world, starting goaltender, Roberto Luongo, being pulled in two consecutive elimination games. These types of performances would be the stepping-stones to a memorable game in Chicago on Easter Sunday. Instead of giving the starting goaltender nod to Luongo for game six, head coach of the Canucks, Alain Vigneault, took a serious gamble by giving backup goaltender Cory Schneider his first ever playoff start.
Vancouver started the game with a bang. Scoring within the first 2 minutes of the opening face-off. To no surprise it was the Sedin twins who combined on the goal with Daniel getting the pass from Henrik. Cory Schneider was tested early and often by the Blackhawks offense, but looked very calm and under control between the pipes. He stopped two breakaways in a row by Hawks snipers.
At the 15-minute mark of the first period the Blackhawks finally put one past the young net-minder. Bryan Bickell capitalized on a turnover that was caused by a huge hit from the Hawks Bolland, which made the Vancouver defensemen cough the puck up right to Bickell who was sitting all alone in the slot for a gimmie goal. The Canucks responded well with an immediate goal when Alex Burrows buried home a turnover right in the slot by the Blackhawks defense, 2-1 Canucks.
From there the physical play really stepped up. There was some serious body banging going on to open up the second period where you could feel the intensity, and the magnitude of this game really picking up from there. The Blackhawks missed a golden opportunity with a 5 on 3 power play for 1:43 when they could not convert. Fortunately for them they were able to tie the game 2-2 when a miscommunication between Goalie Schneider and a D man caused a turnover for practically an open net goal by Dave Bolland of the Hawks.
The third period started with wild offensive chances for both teams. Fifty-eight seconds into the third Kevin Bieksa buried home a rebound to put the Canucks back up 3-2. Less than two minutes later Michael Frolik was taken down on a breakaway giving the Blackhawks a penalty shot. Frolik scored on a beautiful deeke, and tied the game at 3-3.
An uneasy moment for Canucks fans came when immediately after the penalty shot goalie Cory Schneider laid on the ice in clear pain. Initial speculation is that he pulled a muscle as he was reaching his leg out to try and make a save on the penalty shot. He was relieved by struggling goalie Roberto Luongo. The third period ended with the Blackhawks on their heals, but the Canucks couldn’t seem to put the game to rest in regulation.
The teams headed into the overtime period tied at 3-3 in what had been an extremely physical battle. Both teams seemed to have even chances throughout the overtime period, slightly giving the territorial edge to the Canucks.
Hard work by Marion Hossa of the Chicago Blackhawks created space for Niklas Hjalmarsson to blast a slap-shot on net from the point. The shot was handled terribly by Roberto Luongo, and rookie Ben Smith was sitting on the doorstep to slam home the deciding goal, 4-3 final.
The Chicago Blackhawks did not lead the entire game until the final goal in overtime to which put them up for good with a 4-3 victory. They will certainly have their word cut out for them as they go into a very hostile Vancouver on Tuesday night to try and pull off the impossible comeback to move on to the second round.
In no other sport than hockey are teams even given a hint of chance to come back in a best of seven series when down by three games. It was quite understandable though that when the defending champs were on the brink of being swept, surely everyone knew they wouldn’t go away easily.
@NYRCenterIce
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