There was of course immediate fear that Sports Illustrated jinxed the Blackhawks season that begins tomorrow night when they put Patrick Kane on the cover and proclaimed Chicago would repeat as Stanley Cup Champions. The 'Hawks will hear over and over again how no team has repeated since the 1997-98 Detroit Red Wings, although much like last year's defending champion Los Angeles Kings, there's good reason for optimism in the Windy City since (unlike the start to the 2010-11 season) many of the key players from last year's Cup run are still on the team. Oh, and as I recall it, the last time I posted a pre-season magazine issue with the Blackhawks on the cover, that was the previous year they won the Stanley Cup.
After winning the Cup in late June, the off-season certainly felt quite short. On top of that, this is also another year in which the regular season will have an asinine three week-or-so interruption because of the Olympics. Of course, the last time there was an Olympics interlude, that was also the season the Blackhawks won the Cup in 2010.
So there's certainly some encouraging signs on that front, but there's also a whole slew of other factors to consider—none of which I can say I'm adequately prepared for. While I actually paid attention to the NHL Draft this off-season, I've been fairly oblivious to other major moves and then there's the entire reshuffling and reorganizing of divisions that also affects the playoffs in ways that I'm not totally certain I completely understand yet.
Still, the puck drops on another NHL season tomorrow and I'll throw my half-assed picks out there, not that I think I'll be taking any tremendous risks.
Horatian work of ca. 18 B.C. / THU 8-14-25 / Molecule that stores energy in
the body, in brief / Larrup / Result of a scandal going viral, in brief /
["Let's go with 'Nickname's the Same' for $400"] Bruce Springsteen, Lance
Armstrong and Melissa McCarthy in a 2016 comedy / A winning scenario in a
best-of-three game / Hasbro word game that comes with a 60-second hourglass
/ Pre-med track precursor, in brief
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Constructor: Gene Louise De Vera
Relative difficulty: Medium
THEME: IN JEOPARDY (62A: At risk ... or where one. might hear the
clue-and-answer pairs at 1...
13 hours ago