Canucks Pushed Back to the Brink of Madness

Da-Da Daa, Da-Da Daa, Da-Da Da-Da-Da-Da Daa.
That Chelsea Dagger song the Chicago Blackhawks crank up after scoring goals at home has to be playing on repeat like a huge bass drum on overdrive in the heads of the Vancouver Canucks, their fans, and especially their all-world goaltender Roberto Luongo.
This was supposed to be the year things went differently in the CHI-VAN series that has seen the Blackhawks advancing and the Canucks skating home the past two seasons. The Hawks had gutted the role players from their Cup winning team of a year ago due to salary cap constraints, most notably gone was converted forward Dustin Byfuglien who notoriously created all kinds of chaos in front of the net. This year the defending champs snuck into the playoffs as an eight seed by default on the last day of the season after the Dallas Stars lost their game to the Minnesota Wild that would have vaulted them over Chicago in the standings.
Oh how the residents of the Canadian Pacific Northwest wished that the Stars had aligned themselves better at this point. Do you really think they would have blown a three games to none series lead against any other team but these Blackhawks? Only four times in NHL history has a playoff series even gotten to a seventh and ultimate game after a team went up 3-0. Chicago, and only Chicago, could have done this to the Canucks, who were universally regarded as the best team coming out of the regular season, and played like it in games one through three.
This is the team that haunts the Canucks as they lay awake at night. They are stuck in their collective psyche and driving them toward a calamitous breaking point. They are on the brink of stark raving madness. After game five and chasing Luongo from his crease for the second game in a row, Blackhawk forward Marian Hossa actually had some sly doubts about whether his team had gotten into Bobby Lu’s head. “I don’t know,” Hossa said. “I can’t see in his head.”
While Hossa was busy craftfully playing the literalist, the answer was made clear for us more speculative types by Vancouver coach Alain Vigneault’s stunning decision to start rookie backup Cory Schneider in net for game six. Some people are putting the crux of the blame for the Nucks recent torment solely upon Vigneault. I’d actually give the coach the benefit of the doubt here. Coaches are more in tune with their team and where their player’s heads are at then anybody in the media or those outside the organization. If he was going to bench a many times over all-star and gold medal winning hero at such a crucial moment, he did so with full and total knowledge of the circumstances which had presented themselves, and with his superiors tacit blessings.
As it turns out the cruel fates of the hockey gods would intervene and place Luongo back into game six anyways after Schneider injured himself getting twisted up in a futile attempt to stop a penalty shot by the Blackhawks Michael Frolik. So Luongo faced his tormentors again coming off the bench cold early in the third period with the game tied at three. He actually acquitted himself well through that frame and the first 15 minutes of a sudden death overtime. It actually seemed like the Canucks would exorcise the playoff demons of years past and escape the Windy City to the second round.
Then an unassuming point shot came flying in from Niklas Hjalmarsson which Luongo tried to bat away in a baffling fashion that left him splayed out on the ice belly down. Chicago rookie winger Ben Smith was there to flip the game winning rebound past the felled netminder. The horn blared and 20,000+ at the United Center roared as the all too familiar chorus rang out. Utter Madness.
Da-Da Daa, Da-Da Daa, Da-Da Da-Da-Da-Da Daa.