Time to just go through some numbers popping out from Game 1 and beyond. You love it when we get nerdy. Nerds are in, you know it, I know it. If only I paid this much attention to math in high school (I think I got a 590 on the Math section on the SAT while rocking the verbal, and my Rain Main-like father never forgave me for it, despite the fact that he was a writer. It was a strange family).
38.2%
That was Jonathan Toews’s Corsi number for Game 1, and that’s with the score adjusted. It’s the third lowest number he has produced in the past two playoffs, as Kopitar kicked him down to a 37% in Game 6 last year in L.A. (while Kane dragged them out of the pits like little Miho got Clive Owen), and earlier last spring Mikko Koivu held him to a 25% in Game 4 against Minnesota. But that’s it, and I guess it says a lot that the Hawks went 2-1 in those games. It’s not a formula the Hawks would have any intention on repeating, though. And just how likely is it the Lightning can keep Toews down… down on the ground…
Have a narrative, why don’t you? With the Hawks top six not producing much, and after the residents here proclaimed it would be the Hawks’ forward depth that would prove to be the difference, here comes the third line providing both goals that put the Hawks up in this series. And no, of course not, there’s no way that Teuvo Teravainen coming up big makes me feel especially good after all the shit we got for extolling his virtues. Why would you ever think that? He’s not special in any way.
As we previewed this series, and most others did, I feel like it was generally agreed that John Cooper was a pretty good coach. And while he probably wouldn’t come up with some novelty for this, he would do what was necessary. Well, tonight he kind of fucked up.
Game Time: 7:00PM Central TV/Radio: NBC, CBC, TVA, WGN-AM 720 Reinventing Axl Rose: Raw Charge
A year later, the Blackhawks finally find themselves in the position they should have been in with 20 minutes to play against the Kings on June 1st. And with them, a return to the only hockey that matters. Hockey whose outcome will determine names engraved in silver, and on the Hawks’ side of the ledger, a chance at solidifying even much more than that. Standing in their way is now the Tampa Bay Lightning, a team more than comfortable at not only playing the exact game the Hawks want to and possibly even faster, but also gleefully seizing the opportunity to play the upstarts and define their own story rather than be a footnote in someone else’s.
Have to thank the girlfriend for providing the Less Than Jake reference, because I’m not a fan but we need to vary it from Against Me! and Tom Petty. Like once or twice.
So we’ve got to wrap up this preview, and cover the special teams for Tampa and how it all plays out. Let’s get to it.
Sometimes the greatest successes come at a time when it’s seemingly the last shot for them. Such is the case for both the translucent ginger bearded El-P and the moutainous neckbearded Killer Mike, who together in the last three years have emerged as rap’s most formidable duo while both being well north of 35 years old. But their rise to the top was anything but overnight.
Hailing from Brooklyn, El-P cut his first records with the beloved Company Flow collective, which famously held the motto “Independent As Fuck”. After the group’s dissolution, El struck out on his own both creatively and in the business realm, founding and running the Definitive Jux record label, which gave a platform to such amazing acts as Cannibal Ox, Murs, and former beard of the day Aesop Rock. All three of El-P’s records are considered masterworks in both dystopic lyrical density as well as otherworldly production reminiscent of the walls of sound once produced by Public Enemy’s Bomb Squad.
In early 2012 he was put in touch with Atlanta’s Killer Mike through a mutual friend at Williams Street Records, the label that’s associated with Adult Swim, which is also based in Atlanta. Mike came up through Outkast’s Dungeon Family, with several critical acclaimed works of his own while also occasionally stealing the show with guest verses on Outkast tracks, most notably the incredible “Flip Flop Rock” on Speakerboxxx, where he stood among the giants of industry in former beard of the day Big Boi and Jay-Z.
The two developed such a rapport El-P produced Mike’s brilliant R.A.P. Music in 2012 and became fast friends, leading them to collaborate on a project they called Run The Jewels, named after a brief stick up scene at the beginning of LL Cool J’s “Cheesy Rat Blues”. Backed by El’s assaulting production, his lyrical dexterity has perfectly complimented Mike’s fiery political delivery, and the two have surged to the top of every critic’s best-of lists with two albums that contain absolutely no filler and are even more bone crushing live. Run The Jewels 2 was widely regarded not only as the best rap record in ages, but also as the best record, period, of 2014, and it along with its predecessor were released completely for free.
So now that they’re here, there’s only one way to keep what they’ve got, and it’s an appropriate message now that the postseason has reached June: Lie, Cheat, Steal. Kill, Win. Everybody doin’ it.
