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Game Time: 7:30 PM Central
TV/Radio: CSN/WGN
Buyers Domain: The Copper & Blue
Now the meatballs have nothing left to hope for… Unless they’d like to start calling for Corey Crawford to be called up from the Hogs I guess. We know we’re “stuck” with Cristobal Huet and Antti Niemi for the remainder of the season. And don’t let them get you down, there are worse places to be.. like in Edmonton for example, where their new free agent goaltender (and our dear old friend) is currently facing jail time (Side note – if Khabby goes to jail, does he still count against the cap? I guess it helps he was already on IR). We’ll spare you another lecture why the goalie situation is overblown – we’ve been over it a thousand times and if you don’t agree with us now, there is probably nothing that we or anyone else can say that will end up changing your mind. So it goes
What we will tell you is that the Hawks didn’t make a mistake by not moving someone today. I’m sure they tried and if something had presented itself then I’m sure they would have jumped. One problem they likely had was an asking price that was simply far too steep. Right now this team is stacked from top to bottom with skaters but clearly not fully set in goal. Other teams know this and aren’t going to go easy on the Hawks – they’re going to try to get the absolute most out of a team. What would you be willing to give up to get Tomas Vokoun? McClure said last night he hoped Bowman wouldn’t act rashly and overpay – he didn’t. That’s good news right? Relax, don’t worry, have a homebrew.
What we have now, are two goalies who can stop worrying about being traded and start to get their games on track again. Neither looked good last night (particularly Niemi though). I can’t imagine what it’s like to worry about an upcoming trade but I’d imagine it doesn’t lend itself to fully focusing on stopping a little rubber puck. Likewise all the other players like Versteeg (yeah.. no exclamation again) and Buff can hopefully stop thinking about a trade. Lets just assume Seabrook was worried about a trade as well for some reason and can get his head right again because I think we’re all getting a little tired of his play lately.
On to tonight.. our opponents weren’t nearly as quiet today. The Oilers are getting Matt Marquardt, Ryan Jones, Aaron Johnson (remember him?), a couple picks, and in probably the “biggest” move of the day – getting Ryan Whitney for Lubomir Visnovsky. So this team will have some holes in it tonight. None bigger though than the one left by the fact that Sheldon Souray is out for the season after getting an infection in his hand after surgery… which just sounds gross. I guess he should have listened to his doctor when he told him to avoid “punching the cabbie” for at least a month after the operation.
There’s not really much to say about the Oilers.. they’re bad. Really bad. Phenomenally bad. Give Dany Heatley some credit – he was right to stay the hell away from this team. There really isn’t any good reason the Hawks shouldn’t walk out of this game with 2 points after 60 minutes of play. That’s not to say it’s a Mark Messier guarenteed win because we’ve seen the Hawks lose games they absolutely should have won – but losing two games in a row to the Islanders and Oilers would be really depressing and I don’t think Toews will stand for it. Lets hope not anyway.
And don’t think we aren’t going to end this without passing up one last opportunity to tell you to buy a copy of Committed Indian tonight. Sam and his minions will be in all the usual spots. McClure and I however will be at The Bottom Lounge starting the drinking and eating early. We’ll of course be there after as well and you should be too. You don’t have to go to the game, you don’t even have to buy a copy of the Indian (though it helps), you just have to show up and drink. The Bottom Lounge is at 1375 W. Lake St. – we’ll be upstairs and there will be evidently be drink specials and of course all kinds of good times. They run a bus to and from the game so you really have no excuse not to be there.
Lets Go Hawks