- Chi-town, USA. Greatest anthem experience in the league, loud building. The organ is sweet and Jim Cornelison has some great, great pipes. Home ice should be absolutely nuts on both sides during the course of this series. Great atmosphere.
- Going to be annoying when Chicago fans start cheering during the Anthem in San Jose though. Listen for it. It will happen, and you will hate it.
- Dangerous transition team, prone to inconsistency. It’s the second time in row a team has come off a big series win to take on the Sharks. And we all know how the last one turned out.
- Keith on Thornton all series. That will be a battle for the ages. They’re pretty deep on the backend, but the Sharks can capitalize on Niemi’s wild inconsistency. Whether or not they can pour on enough shots to do that is the question.
- Chicago doesn’t like to play the physical game, and San Jose has shown a willingness to do so all postseason long. If they continue to pound the body and scrap away in the corners it will throw the Hawks off their game. Look what a relentless team did to them in round one against Nashville.
- If you try to play run and gun with the Hawks you’ll get torched, but the Sharks again have limited their turnovers and have been content to dig in the corners. That’s a big key to this series.
- Two years ago I looked at the potential for a rivalry to become established between these two teams. Both have some good young talent, and will likely be competitive both now and in the near future (with Chicago obviously having a little more shelf life). All we needed was a playoff series, and now we got it.
- Getting up the hate for the Hawks is kind of hard for me. Sharpie is a good guy, Toewser has a laser, Keith, Seabrook, Madden… list goes on, some classy dudes. Then you get into Kane and Byfuglien territory and realize it won’t be that hard after the puck drops in game one. I swear, the median of douchebagitivity on Chicago is a three, but the mean is about an 8.5 with those guys included.
- Booing Brian Campbell is kind of lame, but whatevs.
- Sharks are playing the best hockey out of anyone in the Western Conference right now but holy hell I’m starting to get nervous. Should be epic.
- Six games minimum. Thought the same against Detroit, so what do I know.
- Western Conference Finals. Unreal.
Full series preview tomorrow afternoon.
God save us all.
Go Sharks.
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