All votes for the NHL’s MVP award were turned in before the playoffs began, so anything that happens in the postseason has no bearing on who wins the Hart Trophy.
If there were any doubt about who should win, however, Patrick Kane reminded those viewers still awake why the award belongs in his growing trophy case. He scored a highlight reel goal at 3:07 of the second overtime to keep the Blackhawks’ season alive and force a Game 6 back in Chicago with a 4-3 win over the St. Louis Blues.
The Blackhawks had no business defeating the Blues at Scottrade Center. They were badly outshot, they were badly outplayed and when the Blues erased a 3-1 third-period deficit, the Hawks looked like they were employing a rope-a-dope strategy in the first overtime by icing the puck after flurries of St. Louis scoring chances.
As any coach will tell you, however, that’s why elite skill is such a game-changer. It can mask deficiencies and overcome mistakes with one sleight of hand.
On the game-winner, Kane faked former teammate Troy Brouwer to the ice with some ridiculous stick handling near the right circle, and then split defenseman Alex Pietrangelo and center Paul Stastny to put a shot on net. While everyone else tried to figure out where the puck was, Kane kept his feet moving and circled the net to pick up the rebound at the far post and tuck it in the open cage.
It was Kane’s fifth career OT winner, moving him into a tie with Edmonton’s Glenn Anderson for the third most in NHL history — one behind Montreal’s Maurice Richard and three behind Colorado’s Joe Sakic.
“I was trying to tell myself to play with confidence and I wasn’t very good the first four periods,” Kane told reporters in St. Louis after the game. “Maybe it was my turn to step up tonight and do something there in overtime, which I’ve been waiting a lot longer than I should.”
Kane had taken mild criticism for failing to score in the first four games of the series, a silly analysis when the Art Ross Trophy winner was still averaging a point per game.
Kane has scored enormous goals for the Blackhawks in their six-year reign of terror. It was Kane that ended the franchise’s 49-year Stanley Cup drought with the OT winner against Philadelphia in Game 6 of the 2010 Cup Finals.
“He’s a clutch player. Obviously, he’s a great player,” Chicago coach Joel Quenneville said. “Not a lot of players can do what he did, or does.”
Which is why the Blackhawks are never out of it, even when they lose 10 players off the previous season’s roster — even when they are facing a vastly improved, bitter division rival that is determined to end its second-class status.
There are a lot of clichés in professional sports. Heart of a champion is one of them, but in watching Kane and the Blackhawks find a way to stay alive it is hard to argue that Chicago has some special sauce to go along with its special talent.
Since winning its first Stanley Cup with this core of players in 2010, Chicago has lost three playoff series. Two went to seven games (Vancouver and Los Angeles) and one went to six (Phoenix). Kane made sure this series would at least follow suit.
“It’s a new year, a new challenge,” Kane said. “This team we’re playing against is a very good hockey team, playing well. So I think there’s a little bit of pressure, a little bit of nervousness — which I think is good, too. It gets everyone excited.”
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