Not Thornton, Marleau or the once Chicago favorite Roenick (who has yet to score a goal this year). But maybe we should… the Sharks have beaten the Hawks in 11 straight games, including the rough loss to them last year on the night we honored Hull and Mikita – the game that gave Campbell a taste of hockey in Chicago at its best (fan-wise that is).
The Sharks are once again a very strong team, perhaps the best in the West. They’re leading the conference with 29 overall points. What’s helping them the most, and what is the best for the Hawks, is that 21 of these 29 points have come at home where the Sharks are 10-0-1. On the road they’re much more average going 4-3-0.
Obvious other big news here would be Campbell facing his team from the second half of last season. He was just a hired gun at the deadline but was supposedly offered a big contract and treated like royalty by the Sharks organization. It might get some play but I really think there’s nothing here. It’s certainly no Pittsburgh-Hossa-Detriot deal.. It’ll be a bigger deal when the Hawks have to travel to Buffalo which won’t happen til next year unless both teams make the cup (not gonna happen).
More on the game if you want to click below:
As mentioned by Massey1984 in the comments from last game’s recap – this could be a high scoring game. The Sharks are ranked third overall in Goals for per game at 3.39 and have scored the most goals so far with 61. They’ve played 3 more game than our Hawks though which means the 51 goals the Hawks have scored gives them a very slight advantage in average coming in at a flat 3.40.
Both teams have been strong defensively too though – The Sharks have the advantage on Goals against allowing only 2.39 a game while the Hawks let in 2.47.
The Hawks are also facing a hot Power Play team – in their last game, where they also beat the Flames 6-1, the Sharks scored 4 times with an extra skater. The Hawks have been great on the kill this year though and are still near the top of the league killing penalties 89.6% of the time. I’d still like to see them stay out of the box against this team though.
I’m thinking this could be a let-down game of their own for the Sharks – They’re coming off a strong win and are playing a team they usually have no problems with. The Hawks meanwhile are coming off a hard loss and should be playing with a little extra fire.
And.. this continuous loss streak to a team has to end sometime right?
Lets Go Hawks