I don’t know who got the goal, but yeah - Boqvist walks the line and finds the lane better than any Hawk defenseman.

Good to see Kane skating with Toews and Kubalik, if only for the last shift of the period.
- StLBravesFan

The kid was very good. He's the best overall skater on the team and his gap control in transition is outstanding.

Charlie Roumeliotis
@CRoumeliotis

#Blackhawks line of Smith-Kampf-Nylander in 5:51 of 5-on-5 action through two periods:

— 8 shot attempts for and 1 against
— 5 scoring chances for and 1 against
— 1 high-danger chance for and 0 against

====

Shouldn't they be playing more with those stats? Is someone feeding JC these during the game (if he's not able to calculate in his head)?
- pdx2ord

Not with Smith taking dumb penalties and Nylander skating around like a lost puppy

Playing devils advocate:

You know with all these injuries the team is suffering through, you know it’s unrealistic to fire either Bowman or Colliton. This is a lot of adversity for a new coach or any GM to go through and expect him to win or make the playoffs.

I suspect next season about the time the mustache was fired will be the same allotment for both SB and JC. With that said, I would suspect Peter Laviolette would be highly sought after from the higher ups be ready for a change.
- gifman

At the beginning of the season I thought this was a bubble team - in the hunt - probably not good enough to play past the first week of April.

But they didn’t start out playing like it. They looked awful - in al three zones- couldn’t make a play, couldn’t get out of their own end, couldn’t get thru the neutral zone to set up in the forward zone. No structure, plan, or purpose. Only the goalies kept them in games.

Things have improved to where they’re actually playing like a bubble team - which, let’s face it, is the best we can expect from this talent and experience level, especially with the injuries to key players. Still inconsistencies, too many mistakes, too much blown coverage and TOs, not enough ozone pressure - but at least, most nights, they look like a representative true-.500 NHL team. Example: they’ve only given up 21+29 SOG in the last two games.

We’ll have to see whether this improvement is due to coaching or not - but if they can keep up this level of play - and the young players (what was it, 7 with less than 50 games each in the Show?) improve - if Stan can bring in Mitchell next season, get something out of the TDL, have a decent summer - going into next season - I don’t see anyone getting fired for a while.

*NEW* blog up: http://bit.ly/2QxdbKn

Hawks lose vs. Calgary + lose Strome.

Playing devils advocate:

You know with all these injuries the team is suffering through, you know it’s unrealistic to fire either Bowman or Colliton. This is a lot of adversity for a new coach or any GM to go through and expect him to win or make the playoffs.

I suspect next season about the time the mustache was fired will be the same allotment for both SB and JC. With that said, I would suspect Peter Laviolette would be highly sought after from the higher ups be ready for a change.
- gifman

I get that argument, however, you have teams like the Penguins who are/have missed a slew of top-line players all season and are still getting results.

Is it a lot to overcome injuries? Yeah, but Colliton should be a professional at his job. It's his job to adjust, to get the players to adjust and work out a system that will work best for what he has at hand. If he is unable to do that, he shouldn't have the job he does.

The kid was very good. He's the best overall skater on the team and his gap control in transition is outstanding.
- fattybeef

Big fan of his, gets lost in his own end sometimes unfortunately but believe with experience he will clean that up.

I like Gilberts game as well he's a kid who can carve out a nice career by really getting good at positioning and space. He's already got the impose my will gene.