Detroit Suck City

Look, I am not going to pretend that I am not disappointed in last night's outcome. Frankly, I had no idea what to expect going into the game and figured that it could go either way, especially given that our local heroes were playing in front of a largely hostile crowd. Given the rivalry, you knew that both teams were going to come out with a tremendous amount of intensity and would lay it all on the line. And you had to figure that with Chicago's offense, giving up only three would give the team a decent chance to win. But ultimately, the team could not solve the riddle that is Joel Pineiro and went down to defeat.

What the?

* In case you missed the Cubs game (and I have no idea why you would have watched it), they lost. Nothing more to see here. Please disperse.

* Boy, it sure is a good thing that the Blackhawks are not playing the Ducks. I, mean, otherwise this team would likely be down two games to... uh... oh, nevermind.

* What disappoints me most about the Blackhawks 3-2 loss was the manner in which two of the Wings' goals were scored. The power play goal I can understand, but the other two, were the result of absolutely brutal turnovers at the Hawks' blue line. First, Brent Seabrook's body was inhabited by the ghost of Michal Sykora and then Brian Campbell magically turned into Eric Weinrich. You simply cannot make such mistakes when playing a team as talented as Detroit. Teddy KGB said it best... "baaaad judgement."

* Just for the record, the Hawks claim that Campbell actually made the correct play and that all credit goes to Michael Samuelsson for making a tremendous defensive play. Oh sure, and the Bulls' intentional plan at the end of games is to have Ben Gordon take a crazy off-balance shot that has about as much chance of going in as Kevin James has of winning an Oscar for his performance in Paul Blart: Mail Cop. Oh, you mean, that really is Vinnie's plan?

* Overall, I thought the Hawks outplayed the Wings and, to be honest with you, I really did not think that it was not even that close. Unfortunately, Osgood was the difference, making numerous tremendous saves. Khabibulin was outstanding as well, but, at the end of the day, Osgood was better. Some might even say he stood on his head. By the way, does anyone have any clue what that means? Does that mean that newly crowned Dancing With the Stars Champion Shawn Johnson (personally, I prefer Nastia) or the dude from American Anthem should be the Hawks' next goaltender? Maybe Alfonso Soriano and his teammates stood on their heads last night too. Yeah, that would explain how Pineiro turned into Bob Gibson.

* I thought the officials had a tough game. The linemen missed a lot of offsides calls and, in my opinion, a number of the penalties were extremely questionable, especially the calls on Byfuglien for goalie interference and on Toews for tripping. Most troublesome was the late hook called on Dave Bolland, which occured immediately after Andrew Ladd was clearly tripped on the other end of the floor. I am not for a second suggesting that the officials had any effect on the outcome of the game, but the late call on Bolland was really too bad given that the Hawks had all of the momemtum after Toews scored the equalizer -- momentum which disappeared quicker than Allen Iverson when he hears a police siren.

* Wings' defenseman Chris Chelios ate nachos and watched the game from the press box as one of the Wings' player scratches. Most interesting is the boxscore. Check it out: "Detroit Scratches: Downey (healthy), Maltby (healthy), McCarty (alcoholism), Chelios (osteoporosis)." And he missed both the early bird at the Golden Corral and a Golden Girls marathon on Lifetime.

* So, is the series over? Fortunately, the answer is no. Yes, it is going to be extremely difficult to win four out of five games against the defending champions, but you simply never know what will happen. In a postgame interview, Kris Versteeg said it best when he summed up game two by saying "this sucks," but I doubt that this team will get down. I predicted the Wings would win before the series started and I am going to stick with my original prediction. Believe it or not, the ultimate pessimist still thinks the Hawks come back stong and make it a real series. Wings in seven...