National Hockey League (NHL): Chicago Blackhawks win Stanley Cup after 4 decades
Let’s take a look back into the team’s history:
The Chicago Blackhawks are based in Chicago, Illinois belonging to the Western Conference of NHL. The franchise was signed on by NHL in 1926. Fredric McLaughlin aka Major McLaughlin was the first owner of Chicago Blackhawks, who served in the World War 1. For a man who was a coffee tycoon and who knew not much about hockey, McLaughlin was on the go.
The Chicago Hawks played their first season in 1926, finishing on the third place by losing to Boston Bruins. This set McLaughlin on fire as he was convinced that his team was good enough. He allegedly fired Pete Muldoon who was the head coach of the team, because he disagreed with him on a number of occasions. According to the Toronto Globe and Mail, Muldoon responded by screaming “Fire me, Major, and you'll never finish first. I'll put a curse on this team that will hoodoo it until the end of time”.
“The Curse of Muldoon” seemed to have prevailed. The Blackhawks were known to be one of the most horrible professional teams in the league by 1987. However, Chicago Blackhawks finally managed to reach their first Stanley Cup in 1931 and in 1932 but deplorably lost in both years.
1933-34 was the year of the Blackhawks as the team finally seemed to have broken the curse, winning the Stanley Cup for the first time. The Blackhawks beat Detroit Red Wings with a score of 3-1.
Blackhawks were on a good streak by the early 60’s. Hawks had won 2 more Stanley Cups in 1937/38 by beating the Toronto Maple Leafs and the second in 1960/61 after eliminating the Detroit Red Wings in the finals.
But the down fall came right at the start of the 70’s. The Blackhawks made the playoffs after fighting their way through each year, making it to the finals of the playoffs but did not succeed in taking the Stanley Cup even once. It came to the point that they lost sixteen straight playoffs.
After 1970, the Hawks could not seem to recover from the treachery, although they were winning division championships. But somehow, the ‘Stanley Cup’ became a dream for the desperate team.
In early 90’s the team at last made it to the finals after almost two decades. The Black Hawk’s finally set a record of 11 consecutive wins throughout the season. The teamed seamed unstoppable. They thirst for winning the cup was long due and this time they were keen on to quench it. Shockingly and shamefully, the Blackhawks lost it and handed it to the Pittsburgh Penguins.
After viewing the brief history of the team, who were once notorious in the game that every American loves, the downfall began.
After the millennium, the Blackhawks realized that they needed to rebuild their team and so they did. In 2007, the Hawks started adding professional players to their rooster. Drafting strong and determined players like Kyle Beach and robust defenders like Brain Campbell and Jordon Hendry made all the difference. The team went from their “Rocky Era” to being one of the strongest and competitive teams in the League. By 2008, the team made a few more trades; they got Andrew Ladd from Carolina Hurricanes in exchange for Tuomo Ruutu.
Just before the 2009/10 playoffs, the Hawks signed on two more players: John Madden, Richard Petiot and Tomas Kopecky who made the team stronger than ever. How could the team loose after drafting from the top picks? The Blackhawks won after five decades due their wonderful composition of the team. It took the Chicago Blackhawks five decades to break “The Curse of Muldoon”. Hawks become unstoppable and they swept Vancouver Canuks in 6 straight games, tearing Nashville Predators apart, beating them in 6 games as well; leading them to a match against San Jose Sharks in the Conference Final, which did not take much effort for the team to beat.
After reaching the Stanley Cup final, the Philadelphia Flyers wasn’t easy for the hungry team but they finally satisfied their hunger after 5 decades of constantly being humiliated and tormented; after being knocked off the playoffs each year. The game ended in style with Patrick Kane. The head strong player was the man-of-the-hour, making the winning shot in overtime.
Tags: