Blackhawks know the road to redemption doesn't stop here

by Bob Herpen
The Phanatic Magazine

If you want to pinpoint a day where it all came crashing down for the Chicago Blackhawks, August 16, 1996 is a pretty good place to start.

If you want to pinpoint a day where it all started to come together for the Chicago Blackhawks, June 22, 2007 is as good as any.

In between, one of the eminent Original Six franchises suffered through more than a decade buried beneath the dirt that lies beneath the hockey wilderness, if you can believe that.

The significance of the two dates in question are pivot points for the club. The first is the day Jeremy Roenick was dealt to the Phoenix Coyotes for Alex Zhamnov, Craig Mills and a first-round draft pick. The other is the day the ‘Hawks took Buffalo native and forward Patrick Kane with the first-overall pick in that year’s draft.

In between, the ledger reads like a nightmare. Eight years out of 10 they missed the playoffs and didn’t advance past round one when they did. Only once (2001-02) did the team finish above .500. There were two last-place finishes in the bunch, and could have been more if they weren’t propped up by expansion Columbus and Nashville.

The only comparable stretch in team annals occurred between 1944 and 1958, the true dark ages, when Chicago missed the playoffs 12 times and wound up in the six-team NHL basement on nine occasions.

Eight men took the head-coaching reins and none lasted longer than the three years Brent Sutter had to suffer through. Reto Von Arx donned the Indian head, as did Jean-Yves Leroux, Boris Mironov, Vladimir Chebaturkin, Kyle Calder, Igor Korolev and the immortal Steve Passmore.

And still, as the legend goes, all home games at the United Center continued to be blacked out per orders of cantankerous then-owner William “Dollar Bill” Wirtz because he believed broadcasting them would hurt home attendance.

However, Wirtz is now dead and the team is run by his son W. Rockwell “Rocky” Wirtz, the management has embraced heroes of the past like Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita, and most importantly, the Blackhawks have run off three straight winning seasons for the first time since reeling off seven in a row from 1989-96.

Just this past season, Chicago obliterated its own record book, winning a franchise-record 52 games (three more than the previous mark set in 1971 and 1991) and amassing 112 points (five more than the old record of 107 first done in 1971and ‘72). One season after reaching the Western Conference Finals, the Blackhawks are competing for the Stanley Cup for the first time since 1992.

That year, under Iron Mike Keenan, the ‘Hawks won 11 straight games through three series only to be dumped in a four-game sweep by defending-champion Pittsburgh.

What Kane, Jonathan Toews, Duncan Keith, Brian Campbell, Dustin Byfuglien and Antti Niemi are up against now is no small feat: they are in charge of not only returning the Blackhawks to respectability by being part of a consistent winner, they are also now burdened with ending an NHL-longest 49-year championship drought.

It is something that the following lights in franchise lore could not accomplish: Dennis Hull, Pat Stapleton, Wayne “Chico” Maki, Tony Esposito, Jim Pappin, Doug Wilson, Steve Larmer, Denis Savard, Ed Belfour, and Roenick.

If the desired result is attained, unbelievably, the names two paragraphs above will join such Hall-of-Famers as Hull, Mikita, Glenn Hall and Pierre Pilote, with the solid Ken Wharram and Eric Nesterenko providing support – who only lifted the ultimate prize once.

Even if the Cup is not paraded in Grant Park roughly two weeks from now, the recent brief surge of success should serve as a wake-up call to America’s Second City that hockey is back on the rise.

What’s always paired with the joy of renaissance, though, is the burden of expectation – from the front office and the fans – that the wins and banners and titles will keep on coming.

Even more so than the impending best-of-seven series, what looms on the horizon for the players donning the red and black will be the spectre of gearing up for several more seasons like the ones that have preceded it.

In each of the last five campaigns that followed a Blackhawks appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals, the club has not returned to the final round. Only in 1962, the year after the last victory, did the ‘Hawks survive long enough in the postseason to make a return trip to the title round.

Since 1961, Chicago’s legacy of “winning” has been mired in the “good, but not good enough” pile. Twice, in 1971 and 1973, they fell to powerhouse Montreal Canadiens teams in the Finals. Semifinal defeats followed in 1974 and 1975.

Between 1982 and 1995, they reached the Campbell/Western Conference Finals seven times. In ’82, a below-.500 team lost to the slightly less below-.500 Vancouver Canucks. In ’83, ’85 and ’90 it was the dynastic high-octane Edmonton Oilers that spoiled their hopes. Calgary did the deed in 1989 and rival Detroit halted the run in the shortened ’95 course.

It can be a crushing set of circumstances for a team riding the wave of youth. Kane and team captain Toews are both 21. Defenseman Nik Hjalmarsson is 22 and center Dave Bolland is 23. Forwards Troy Brouwer and previous Cup winner Andrew Ladd are 24, as is playoff hero Dustin Byfuglien.

They have nothing but time ahead of them. It is in their best interest to keep the good karma flowing by doing their best on every single shift to represent the rebirth of the logo and to attract the attention of this proud and hungry city.

Years from now, if you want to pinpoint a day where it all began again for the Chicago Blackhawks, May 23, 2010 will be a pretty good one to look back on. A date in early June would be even better.