Eight Men In: The Blackhawks' Plug-and-Play Dynasty

THIRD PERIOD, GAME SIX of the 2013 Stanley Cup Finals: With 77 seconds left, the home team Boston Bruins -- trailing three games to two -- led the Chicago Blackhawks, 2-1.

It was win or go home time for Boston. Win and go home for Chicago. 

Seventy-eight seconds later, the Blackhawks were Stanley Cup champions.

Extra! Extra! Extra!
June 16, 2015

What happened in those final ticks of the clock was textbook Chicago hockey for a eight-year span almost unparalleled in the modern era.

They potted two goals in 18 seconds, each by a man who was for all intents and purposes an x-factor, a replaceable spare part for a star-heavy juggernaut that would capture the cup three times in six years, a championship hat trick.

Bagging the tying goal at 18:44 was Bryan Bickell, a bottom six winger who'd netted nine goals in a lockout-shortened 48-game season, assisted on the scoresheet by future Hall of Famers Jonathan Toews and Duncan Keith, and off the sheet by the third star in that constellation, winger Patrick Kane.

Starting deep in their own zone, Keith corralled a loose puck and dropped it to Kane. He carried it up ice facing all five skating Bruins, flowed through three of them, broke to his left and fired a shot that B's netminder Tuukka Rask deflected to his blocker-side corner. 

There the stars went to work digging out the puck, from Kane to Keith to Toews who spotted Bickell just outside the blue paint. With a perfect pass through the skates of towering Boston d-man Zdeno Chara the puck was on Bickell's stick, then behind Rask and in the net.

Tie game.

The Bruins, who had won the cup just two years earlier with substantially the same cast, were rattled. Eighteen seconds later, they were beaten.

Cup I: 2010 vs. the Flyers,
four games to two

Boston had won the ensuing faceoff but immediately lost possession. Chicago quickly reentered the Bruins' zone. Rask kicked away Michael Frolik's shot from above the right circle, Marcus Krüger retrieved the puck from the left boards, sliding it back to defenseman Johnny Oduya. He flung a shot from the blue line. Rask stopped but didn't control it. 

Hawks' center Dave Bolland at the edge of the crease quickly punched it home. 3-2 Chicago. A minute later it was official, for the second time in four years, the Hawks were champs. 

Two years later -- and now 10 years ago -- they'd capture the cup again, this time on home ice. Cue the Fratelli's Chelsea Dagger, that mocking goal song hated by opponents but loved by Hawks' fans, all 110% of the United Center's nightly SRO crowds.

Three cups in six seasons. And just eight men played for all three squads.

The remainder of the roster was strictly plug and play, a master class in roster and cap management by Blackhawks GM Stan Bowman. Win, back up, retool and do it again. And again. Forty-nine different men are listed across the team's three Cup final program rosters.

Keith, the Norris Trophy and Conn Smythe Award-winning defensive anchor, voted with Kane and Toews as one of the top 100 NHL players of all time, appeared in 1,192 games over 16 years, second most in franchise history. 

Kane, played 1,161, also in 16 seasons, the third most. Toews, the captain, would play 1,062 games in 15 years, good for fifth all time, but second all time in team points with 1,225 (446G/779A). (For the curious, HoFer Stan Mikita heads games, points and assists, Bobby Hull in goals.)

Bickell played 364 games, tallying 135 points but sticking for all three cups Bolland, with 168 points in 332 GP, stayed for just two, part of the ever changing cast.

Cup II: 2013 vs. the Bruins,
also four games to two

Forward Kris Versteeg was there in 2010 for Cup One, a nail-biting six game triumph over the Philadelphia Flyers. Four of those matches were decided by a single goal, two in OT, including the decider via a sotto voce dagger from Kane.

Versteeg had bounced from the 'Hawks to the Toronto Maple Leafs, to the Flyers and the Florida Panthers before being reacquired by Chicago in 2013, and taking part in the cup-hoisting of 2015, their defeat of the up-and-coming Tampa Bay Lightning at the Madhouse on Madison.

Stars weren't safe either. Defenseman and part-time winger Dustin Byfuglien looked like a keeper after Cup one. Nope. Dealt to the Atlanta Thrashers in the off-season where he blossomed into a Norris candidate. Just six days later, the man called Buff was joined there by 19 goal/38 point man Andrew Ladd, who went on to captain the reincarnated Winnipeg Jets.

Even the goalies didn't stick. For 2009/10 it was Antti Niemi and Cristobol Huet. For 2012/13 it was Corey Crawford and Ray Emery. Finally, by 2015 it was Crawford, Scott Darling and Antti Raanta.

Cup III: 2015 vs. the Lightning,
four games to two after being
down two games to one.

Rounding out the core group retained for all three cups: forwards Marian Hossa and Patrick Sharp, plus d-men Niklas Hjalmarsson and Brent Seabrook. And that's it.

In all: nine men played for the first and second champs: the eight plus Bolland. Nine played for the first and third thanks to Versteeg's return.

Five others got to stay for just championships two and three: agitator Andrew Shaw, fellow forwards Daniel Carcillo and Krüger, plus Oduya, and Crawford.

Churn, churn, churn. Win. Win. Win.

Three cups in six years, plus trips to the conference finals in '09 and '14. It was, and remains, as good a run as any team has had in the hard cap era.

Postscript

To be sure, behind the scenes all was not well in the Hawks organization as it later became public that the team's video review coach in 2010 had been the subject of player sexual assault allegations quashed by the team as it strove for that first championship. 

Eleven years later, the NHL fined the team $2 million. Bowman and Quenneville were each banned for nearly three years for their failure to deal with the situation when it arose.

 At the end of the day, winning isn't everything.

-- Follow me on f/k/a Twitter @paperboyarchive

Canadiens-Islanders Stanley Cup Final 42 Years Overdue

IT WAS EXPECTED TO BE the best vs. the best, the reigning dynasty vs. the rising power.

But something happened on the way to the 1979 Stanley Cup finals, and the series that performance and passion demanded, pitting the defending champion Montreal Canadiens against the National Hockey League's top regular season team, the New York Islanders, was not to be.

Montreal captain Yvan Cournoyer
hoists the Stanley Cup in 1978. 

The Isles. The Habs. Two storied franchises. Together they combined to win eight consecutive cups, monopolizing hockey's big silver chalice from 1976 through 1983 without ever having to defeat one another in a head-to-head fight for its possession.

Now, 42 years later, and midway through the NHL's semifinals, there remains the possibility to reschedule this date with destiny. 

It's an opportunity that exists only by dint of a provisional divisional realignment prompted by a once-in-a-century pandemic, and the resultant closure of the U.S. Canada border that forced the league to abandon its Eastern and Western conference structure, opening the door to an all-Eastern final.

The Islanders-Tampa Bay Lightning series is tied at two wins apiece, Montreal leads the Vegas Golden Knights, two games to one.

C'est maintenant! This chance may never come again. 

Way back then, the NHL playoffs were a little different. The four division winners got a first-round bye. Those that finished second played a best-of-three preliminary series against one of four wild card teams: those with the highest point totals, that didn't finish in first or second, regardless of their division or conference of origin. Survivors got reseeded for the ensuing rounds. 

The 78-79 Canadiens held up their end, winning the NHL's Norris Division and earning a bye while mayhem played out among the league's hoi polloi. 

The Flower, from the Habs'
1978-79 yearbook

Stacked with Hockey Hall of Fame talent including head coach Scotty Bowman, the Habs rolled up 115 points during the regular season, accruing a 52-17-11 record, second only to that of the Islanders' 116 (51-15-14).

Leading their attack was Guy Lafleur, whose 129 points (52 goals, 77 assists), put him third in the league for scoring. Surrounding Lafleur were sniper Steve Shutt (37G, 40A), Pierre Mondou (31G/41A), Mario Tremblay and Yvon Lambert. Still on the team, though ailing, was their veteran captain, Yvan Cournoyer.

Flashy as the Flying Frenchmen were, defense was their backbone.

Forward Bob Gainey was in the midst of a four-year run as recipient of the Selke Award bestowed annually on the league's top defensive forward. Behind him were a slew of Hall-bound defensemen: Serge Savard, Larry Robinson, Guy Lapointe and Rod Langway. And behind them, superlative goaltender Ken Dryden and backup Michel "Bunny" Laroque.

Loaded though they were, Montreal only narrowly escaped dethronement by the Boston Bruins, who led game 7 of their semi-final series 4-3, with just 2:34 left in regulation when they got caught with too many men on the ice.

Lafleur scored on the power play, sending the game into overtime where Lambert slid a goal line pass under Boston net minder Gilles Gilbert for the series winner.

The regular season champion Islanders too were stocked with hall-bound superstars starting with center Bryan Trottier and his wingmen, Mike Bossy and Clark Gillies, aka the Trio Grande. Trotts' 134 points (47G, 87A) led the league, capturing the Art Ross trophy as scoring leader and the Hart trophy as MVP. Bossy tallied 69 goals and 126 points, while Gillies added 35 goals and 56 assists.

Sandwiched amid those top scoring forwards was rock solid defenseman Denis Potvin, en route to winning his second straight Norris Trophy as the league's top blueliner, while posting 31 goals and 70 assists. Their head coach was the Hall-bound Al Arbour.

Everything but the Cup.
(From the 1978-79 Islanders yearbook)

Steadily accruing talent since their 1972 incarnation, the Isles lost three straight semifinals before being bounced in the quarters by the '77-78 Toronto Maple Leafs. With a solid supporting cast including goalies Glenn Resch and Billy Smith and that gaudy regular season performance, they seemed primed to take the next step.

They stepped, and fell, over the rival New York Rangers, a wild card team who'd dispatched the Los Angeles Kings and then the Philadelphia Flyers en route to their semifinal clash with their suburban brethren. 

Four of the series' six games were decided by a single goal, twice in overtime -- both Islanders' victories -- but it didn't matter. After knotting affairs at two games a piece, the Isles dropped game five at the Nassau Coliseum and game six at Madison Square Garden. 

Just like that, the NHL's top regular season team was done, or undone, and in any event, finished. Snuffed out. There would be no faceoff with the Habs, who beat the Rangers four games to one, capturing the cup for the fourth straight year.

Had things played out differently, Montreal might have surrendered the cup to the Islanders much in the same way the Isles would lose it to the upstart Edmonton Oilers in 1984, launching that next dynasty. 

Though the Habs and Isles met in subsequent series, most recently the 1993 semis won by Montreal, the potential for a main-à-main struggle for the silver was formatted out of existence, until now.

While there's no replacing that missing bookend to the Canadiens-Islanders-Oilers succession, there is -- as of this writing -- at least the potential for serving up a variation on that NHL finale fans were denied so many years ago.

Now may never come again.

-- On twitter @paperboyarchive

Tomorrow the World, Part I

FOR PURE BADASS GRANDEUR, it's hard to beat the Stanley Cup.

A horse-and-buggy era prize still fought for in the time of self-driving cars, it's the mac daddy of big league trophies. So cool, it defines the National Hockey League championship. The object of the game is to possess it. NHL dynasties are measured by success in doing so.

One...

Two...

Sure, the other so-called major team sports have their prizes. The NBA bestows something like a golden basketball perched on the edge of a wastebasket, the NFL has its trylon-impaled chrome football and baseball has, well... let's come back to that.

Formally known as the Larry O'Brien Trophy -- named for a long-time league commissioner -- the National Basketball Association's top award is actually a two-foot tall, Tiffany & Co.-cast sterling silver ball and hoop, sheathed in 24-karat gold. While not lacking for bling, according the Maps of the World website, it suffers from a lack of recognition and perhaps of cachet.

Tiffany also makes the venerable Vince Lombardi Trophy, awarded annually to the NFL's Super Bowl winner. Appearances aside, it's not chrome, but sterling silver like its NBA cousin.

Three...

Dynasty!

The baubles are bestowed, but nobody speaks in terms of Larrys or Lombardis won. It's about three-peats and one for thumb. The hardware is almost incidental, announced trips to Disney World more memorable.

Soccer too has a sought-after "cup,"* but the emblematic trophy, which stands just 14.5 inches (36.8 cm) tall, is kind of dinky considering the planetary nature of the tourney that precedes it.

So Lord Stanley's grail, at nearly three feet (89.54 cm) tall and 34.5 pounds (15.5 kg) is the undisputed heavyweight champion of championship hardware.** All hail to the lord of the rings.

But there was once a challenger.

Wha?

If you were born after 1990, the 30-team NHL may seem like part of the firmament, an immense and immensely successful and mostly stable major league. In the geologic history of the sport, however, that's a relatively recent development.

For most of its history, the NHL was tiny, mono-divisional unit romanticized nowadays as the Original Six that included no team south or west of Chicago. All that changed when the league doubled in size in 1967, then added two more franchises in 1970.

In 1971, six of its 14 teams were veritable toddlers, two more mere infants, and not all of them were healthy. Two of the new teams would ultimately move and one of those two would later fail.

Enter the World Hockey Association, boldly going where major league hockey had never gone before: Cleveland.

A fight to capture the globe

Plus Edmonton,  Winnipeg, Quebec City and Houston. Franchises were also placed in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, St. Paul and Ottawa. Twelve in all took the ice in 1972, half of them in markets without an NHL rival. They raided the elder league for talent and signed away the Blackhawks' Bobby Hull, the Bruins' Derek Sanderson and the Flyers' Bernie Parent. Red Wings legend Gordie Howe came out of retirement to play with sons Marty and Mark on the Aeros in Houston.

All they needed was a championship trophy.

Teams, talent and trophies cost money, so the WHA's top prize got a sponsor. The AVCO Financial Services Corp. paid $500,000 for the right to put it's name on the Avco World Trophy. True to it's name, it came with a crystalline globe that appeared to float in the Lucite stem connecting the silvered bowl to its cylindrical base. While it wasn't the Stanley Cup, it was pursued all the same.

Over the six seasons the trophy was available (it was absent in year one), Winnipeg's Jets won it the most, three times, including 1976 when the Bobby Hull and company swept the Howe family and friends in four straight.

The star studded rosters for the WHA's 1976 Avco World Cup championship series.

The world was not enough. After seven tumultuous seasons that saw both the NHL and WHA rocked by franchise instability and failure, they declared peace. Winnipeg, Edmonton, Hartford and Quebec City were admitted to the elder league. The World Hockey Association folded and its planetary award became a part of hockey history.

But about that baseball trophy

Despite it's name, there's never been anything particularly worldly about Major League Baseball's World Series, a tournament that has included a team based outside the U.S. just twice since 1903.

Nonetheless, top teams were annually crowned the World Champions and, starting in 1967, received a flag bedecked gold and black trophy attesting to that status though the knobby appendage at the center of its base was not a globe, but a baseball.

But, in 1999, the MLB's (nameless) Commissioner's Trophy was redesigned, by Tiffany, and the award's recipient was subtly downgraded from World Champion to World Series Champion.

Sterling silver became the dominant color, with gold accents, while the stair-step ring of flags, one for each MLB franchise remained. The knobby appendage, which had been flanked by press pins representing the pennant winners fighting for that year's title, all vanished. So too did a gold hoop and crown.

In their place: a curving dome featuring baseball stitching, in gold, and etched in the silver semi-sphere, the latitudinal and longitudinal lines of a globe.

The world, at last.

The 1977 World Champion Yankees and...

... the 2005 World Series Champion White Sox.

* I'm sorry, but that doesn't look very cup-like, but its purloined predecessor did.

* * Russian's Kontinental Hockey League awards it's champion the Gagarin Cup, named for the first Cosmonaut to orbit the earth and return home safely. At least one website says it weighs 40 pounds.