High on the 'Hawks Round II: Sizing up Vancouver

So the first round went pretty much as everyone expected…outside of Maggie the Makak, and bald bombshell Pierre McGuire who predicted that the Flames would walk all over Chicago in the first round. All in all one can’t blame Maggie, after all she is just a monkey. Anyway we’re not here to take shots so let’s look ahead to the second leg of the Blackhawks conquest across western Canada.
Round two pits the Hawks against the Vancouver Canucks, who easily swept the 6th seeded St. Louis Blues, who may have been the worst team to qualify for the playoffs this year. Give credit to Luongo and the Vancouver defense for holding the Blues to 5 goals for in 4 games, but honestly, there was no contest in this series. The Blackhawks will prove to be a much more worthy adversary in round two. Vancouver is a team that is similar to Calgary in some areas, mainly along the blue line where the average height is slightly over 6’3. The Canucks’ defense, like Calgary is big, and not as mobile as the Chicago d-corps. Vancouver is a team that, like the Flames can also have trouble producing offensively in 5-on-5 situations, but that’s where the similarities end. Unlike the Flames, the Canucks have a dangerous power play unit for two simple reasons: Henrik, and Daniel Sedin. They’ve been called the “Sedin sisters,” the “Olson twins,” Don Cherry even refers to them as the “Bobsy Twins,” but the fact of the matter is that on the power play and 4 on 4 situations these kids are nasty. Unlike round one foe Jarome Iginla, who the ‘Hawks successfully checked nearly all series; the Sedins are much more slippery and creative with time and space. Oh yea, the Canucks also have the best goaltender in the league in Roberto Luongo. Luongo is much bigger than Miikka Kiprusoff, and is more of a shot blocking goaltender than a reactionary shot saver like Kiprusoff. This means that Luongo will cough up the occasional juicy rebound, which sometimes seems to be the only way to get a puck behind him. The Blackhawks will need to get lots of traffic in front of the net to dig for loose pucks and rebounds, as well as to get into Luongo’s head…which can be done. Luongo has a tendency, which unfortunately has become increasingly popular league wide, to embellish minor contact with him in and around the goal crease. He will dive, flop and complain to officials to try and manufacture power plays for his team. Sometimes penalties do result, but if Chicago can get the Canucks’ goaltender to worry more about players interfering with him than stopping the puck, in the long run it could bode well for the ‘Hawks. Other than the Sedins and Luongo, the Canucks are a faster skating team than Calgary. Chicago’s team speed is still better, but the Canucks will skate better than what the ‘Hawks have seen in the playoffs thus far. Up next…we’ll focus on the keys to continued success for Chicago.