Campbell and the Spin-o-rama

There is a lot of complaining going on over on the message boards today regarding Brian Campbell's spin-o-rama gone bad that led to the Wild's 2nd goal last night. I talked about this below, but he was clearly tripped. There's a reason why guys use this move (Denny Savard anyone?) and it always seems to electrify the crowd. One example is shown below when Campbell was with the Sharks.



If you want to complain about Campbell's contract, yea, I get that. But as someone noted on the message boards, it's ridiculous to complain about the guy's on-ice play. Give me a break.

Most Ridiculous Comment on the Blackhawks "Official" Message Board

Since I have made my way back to being an avid follower of the Blackhawks again, I have also had the opportunity over the past year to read the message boards over at the Blackhawks official homepage.

I don’t need to go on any long spiel about how outrageous a lot of people on message boards are because everybody knows this. I try to stay away from reading those boards as possible; it’s just way too frustrating to read what some people say on there. However, I always find myself there because, believe it or not, there are a few people who do have an idea of what they are talking about. Most of the time, though, they are drowned out by all the idiots who love to rip players, blame everyone and panic after each and every loss.

I’ve been around hockey enough to know when a team plays great, good, mediocre, bad and downright abysmal (Trust me, my high school team won a combined 10 games my last two years, I know). It’s a sport and every team is going to have games in each of those categories every year. Why do I bring this up? Mainly because, yes, the Blackhawks, for the most part last night, played pretty mediocre. There were some bright spots, but, mostly mediocre. However, people tend to forget (or not realize or refuse to admit) that they played on the road against a team who has yet to lose a game in regulation (currently the Wild sit at 6-0-1). Is it possible that the Wild are good, possibly really good this year? The Hawks are young (3rd youngest) and it’s something I will return to many times this year. Should they make the playoffs? Yes. Should they win the Cup? No.

So where am I going with this? Because I regretfully find myself on the message boards at some point almost every day, I’m going to introduce a new segment to this new blog: “Most Ridiculous Comment on the Message Board.” I don’t think it really needs much more explaining. So without further ado, I give you today’s most ridiculous comment:

“Campbell is an albtross on defense and he will be the downfall of the team. It is possible this is the worst signing by the Hawks and might make the top three in the NHL.”

I don’t even know where to start. It’s comments like this that get me very frustrated, but I think pointing them out to others to take in may just help ease my frustration.

Hawks fall to Wild 3-2 in Minnesota

The Blackhawks dropped their 2nd game in a row tonight in somewhat frustrating fashion against the Minnesota Wild. The turning point, in my eyes, was when Brian Campbell attempted to do his spin-o-rama in the Wild zone, was tripped and lost the puck. The Wild picked it up, stormed down the ice and somehow slipped the puck past Huet. Admittedly, I think it was a very weak goal on Huet’s part, but I really think the refs missed Campbell getting tripped up.

The Hawks did outshoot the Wild tonight 2 to 1 (36-18), but it seemed most of the shots were from outside the circles with nobody screening Backstrom. To Backstrom’s credit, he did play really well tonight and made the big saves when he needed to, but if the Hawks are going to settle for long distance shots, they need to get bodies in front of the net.

As for Huet, he looked a little shaky again in net and just doesn’t quite look like the same goalie that ended last season on such a hot streak. I don’t think there was much he could have done on the first and third goals, but he just looks a little shaky to me. It’s still too early for me to panic about Huet, but I think this whole mess with him and Khabibulin is affecting him more between the ears and less actually between the pipes. No doubt he has the ability; let’s just hope he finds it sooner than later.

Now a few notes from the game tonight:

-Dave Bolland had a great penalty kill shift during the Wild’s second penalty. He looked like a man on a mission and that’s always a welcome sight.

-Again, I thought Campbell was tripped and it was a bad no call from the referees. You can be the judge from the video below…and you can also watch the second goal again.

-The Hawks did have some good chances on the 5-3, but you just have to bury those chances.

-Duncan Keith’s decision to step up right before he scored their second goal was a great decision. That’s the perfect opportunity to do so.


The Hawks have the rest of the week to prepare for the Stars. The Stars sit at 3-4-2 and host the Wild Wednesday night before they take on the Hawks Friday night at the UC at 7:30pm.