When the Blackhawks won their three Stanley Cup championships in the previous decade, it took more than four games to get the four wins needed. And, before Gary Bettman presented the Stanley Cup to Jonathan Toews on each of the three occasions, he awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy to Toews, Patrick Kane (should have been Corey Crawford) and Duncan Keith as playoff MVPs. 2010, 2013 and 2015. postseasons, respectively.
The Stanley Cup Final could be decided tonight in Edmonton. Florida brings a 3-0 lead into tonight’s game with a chance to not only win the first championship in franchise history, but could do so in a landslide. Which led Pierre LeBrun (and others) to start wondering out loud (on Twitter/social media) who should win the Conn Smythe. It’s a fantastic debate because there are some really strong candidates.
Gustav Forsling could have been a free agent this summer. After Florida claimed him off waivers from Carolina, he signed a three-year contract with a salary cap hit of $2,666,667 that expires at the end of the 2023-24 season. But Forsling, whom the Blackhawks acquired from Vancouver for Adam Clendening in 2015 and then traded to Carolina in the deal that brought Calvin de Haan to Chicago in 2019, signed an eight-year extension earlier this season to remain in Florida. He has become one of the best defensemen in the entire NHL since he arrived in Florida, where he reunited with his former coach in Chicago, Joel Quenneville. He just turned 28 on Wednesday, so this could be a pretty special birthday week for him.
I mention that Forsling could have been a free agent because we kept talking about the Blackhawks’ desire to improve this summer and who might be available to them on the open market (read: you don’t have to give up any assets to acquire him). . But the Blackhawks actually got him in a trade that not many people paid much attention to nine years ago. And, as the Blackhawks begin to look to move up the standings and use their cap space to upgrade the roster rather than accumulating assets, there are other players who could be available via trade that we might also be interested in. The good folks at Daily Faceoff updated their Top 25 Business Goals board this week.
An innovative thought bubble: Jakob Chychrun can play on both sides of the blue line and as they mention in the list of trade targets, Ottawa is not likely to have three LHDs making at least $8 million for each of their caps . . Then he could be the one available. Would the Blackhawks consider adding Luke Richardson’s nephew to their blueline combination? He would be here all day!
Scott Powers and Mark Lazerus in The Athletic gave us his version of a dream summer for the Blackhawks. They would sign Jake Guentzel and Chris Tanev and find help for Petr Mrazek and a second-line center. It’s a fun exercise and an interesting read.
On Friday, Eric Duhatschek in The Athletic wrote what he felt was the biggest draft mistake for every NHL franchise. He tied the definition of “miss” to the player selected with the pick immediately after where the team made its pick. For the Blackhawks, he said the worst miss was at 18th overall in 2012, when the Blackhawks passed on Andrei Vasilevskiy and selected Teuvo Teravainen. Okay…an all-time great goalie might have been nice. But the Blackhawks did have Corey Crawford at the time. Buying my excuses? Me neither.
But I will suggest some other bugs that comply with Duhatschek’s next choice model:
2005 – No. 7 – Jack Skille over Devin Setoguchi
2005 – No. 43 – Mike Blunden over Paul Stastny
2008 – No. 11 – Kyle Beach over Tyler Myers
2009 – No. 59 – Brandon Pirri over Tomas Tatar
2010 – No. 58 – Kent Simpson over Jason Zucker
2011 – No. 36 – Adam Clendening on Boone Jenner
Finally, I mentioned earlier this week that I’m in Omaha for my son’s travel baseball tournament. Well, last night we went to the Tennessee-Florida State game. History was made and it ended up being one of the most incredible events I have ever attended. I wrote about it last night.
