Blackhawks are bad-ice team, hope to take advantage
BY MARK LAZERUS mlazerus@suntimes.com May 28, 2013 9:32PM
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GAME 1
At Hawks 4
Wings 1
GAME 2
Wings 4
At Hawks 1
GAME 3
At Wings 3
Hawks 1
GAME 4
At Wings 2
Hawks 0
GAME 5
At Hawks 4
Wings 1
GAME 6
Hawks 4
At Wings 3
GAME 7
7 p.m. Wednesday
at Hawks, NBCSN
Updated: June 30, 2013 6:43AM
While the workers at the United Center might be approaching their 19th nervous breakdown trying to deal with the constant building and removal of the Rolling Stones’ stage during their weeklong stay at the Blackhawks’ home arena, the Hawks know they can’t always get what they want in terms of quality ice.“It’s a busy building,”
Jonathan Toews said. “Some nights are tough. That’s the way it is. We can’t really worry about that too much. If it’s chippy a little bit, we’ll just have to play a simple game. Can’t make too many pretty plays. It’s very similar in most buildings.” Not Joe Louis Arena, though. Detroit’s home rink — which the Wings don’t share with the Pistons — is renowned for having some of the best ice in the league. The United Center, however, is known for choppy, bumpy ice caused by the constant use for basketball games and concerts. In fact, a lousy surface might even play in the Hawks’ favor. Just like the Red Wings are used to the quirky bounces off the aging boards at Joe Louis, the Hawks know how to play on the UC’s choppy ice. “We’re kind of used to bad ice here,”
New roommates
The Rolling Stones took over most of the building on Saturday, but the Hawks weren’t planning to skate anyway. They still had the sanctuary of their dressing room and meeting rooms and said the inconvenience was minimal, if anything.
Duncan Keith said the 2006 Stones show was one of the best he has ever seen, but the Hawks were planning to go home and watch hockey rather than stick around for the show.
“I’ll probably watch the Kings-Sharks game,” Niklas Hjalmarsson said. “I’m not a big Stones fan. It’s a little too old for me, I guess.” As for sharing his “house” with rock stars? “It would be the same thing as Kaner, I guess,” Toews quipped.
As the home team for Game 7, the Hawks again will have the luxury of the last line change. In Game 6 in Detroit, coach Joel Quenneville had Toews taking faceoffs against Henrik Zetterberg , then rushing off to the bench in favor of Michal Handzus . Expect to see Quenneville keep the two captains separate again Wednesday.
“I think over the course of the season, we didn’t do a lot of matching,” Quenneville said. “We were rolling four lines throughout most of the season. We maybe did a little bit more in the Minnesota series, but we’ve gotten more into matching lines here this series. But whenever we play Detroit, our top two lines generally see a lot of each other.”
