Now that it’s over, the Hawks can shave, get their teeth fixed and do whatever else hockey players do in their off-season, and the rest of us can go back to doing whatever it was we did before we discovered hockey. Baseball, anyone? It’s starting to look like another long, dry summer for the Cubs and the Sox. But the Hawks have already given us a reason to look forward to October.
I was born in Chicago, but I’ve always hated the Blackhawks, mostly because they used to feast on my beloved Minnesota North Stars. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve found myself rooting for the Blackhawks in the Stanley Cup Finals, if only because I hate the Philadelphia Flyers more. Yeah, I know; Chris Pronger’s a thug…but he’s a thug without a championship after Chicago won Game 6, 4-3 in OT.
At least I have an interesting historical anecdote on my side. The Blackhawks came into being after the 1925-26 season, when the Western Hockey League folded. The Portland Rosebuds were sold for $100,000 and moved to Chicago, where the became the Blackhawks. While the Stanley Cup won’t be feted at Pioneer Courthouse Square in downtown Portland, with a few different historical twists here and there, it could have been us.
Thank goodness I didn’t have to watch Chris Pronger skating with the Stanley Cup….
