Hawks live to fight another day

You wonder how many times a team can come back from the dead.

But the Blackhawks apparently aim to find out.

For the third time this postseason, the Hawks seemed to be all but finished, this time having blown a 3-0 lead in less than five minutes.

They were seemingly buried once they lost Nikolai Khabibulin, Martin Havlat, and all their momentum in the second period.

And, yet, they came out in the third period and played Detroit even and scored quickly in the overtime to salvage a game and climb back into the series Friday night at the UC.

They still trail the Red Wings by a game after three contests, but they were only a Detroit goal away from being down three games to zero and making tee times for next week.

"It shows the character of our team that we never believe we're out of anything,'' said winger Troy Brouwer. "The last thing you want to do is dig yourself a big hole, or lose that big lead, but there's never any panic on our bench.

"It starts with the man behind the bench, and it includes every single guy on the team.''

Still, you wonder if this team will run out of lives.

It appeared they had with 3.3 seconds left in the second period, when Khabibulin made a save on a soft shot from 40 feet.

That brought a sarcastic cheer from the faithful, a cascade of boos at the end of the period, Cristobal Huet out of mothballs to start the third, and Corey Crawford to the bench as the backup.

Not to mention the overwhelming feeling that the wheels had officially come off the Hawks' Stanley Cup parade bus.

That was after Detroit scored 3 goals in 4:23 late in the second, and from there the result seemed painfully inevitable.

And since only two teams have ever recovered from down three to win a seven-game series - and neither of them had to face a team of world-class players like the Wings - the Hawks seemed to be cooked.

But once Huet entered the game, the Hawks didn't allow the Red Wings one decent scoring opportunity.

Just as the Hawks stopped skating up 3-0, the Wings stopped skating after they tied it at 3-3, and the Hawks played a strong third period in front of a goalie who hadn't performed since the Eisenhower administration, and carried the action in the very short overtime.

When Patrick Sharp scored the game-winner, the Hawks seemed more assuaged than excited.

"It was a relief,'' said Andrew Ladd, who played a strong game and scored his third goal of the postseason. "We knew the consequences of going down 3-0 in the series.

"It's a credit to the guys in this room that we didn't fold when they tied us.''

It's both admirable and amazing that the Hawks have shown such resilience and so frequently.

However, the Hawks played with fire Friday night, and there's no doubt they've been singed, because even in losing games after huge comebacks against the Flames and Canucks, the Hawks in the process stole the series momentum and wrecked their opponents' confidence.

Detroit may have done that to the Hawks on Friday.

At the same time, the Hawks lost their Stanley Cup-winning goaltender to injury and their top clutch scorer to what had to be a concussion after a freight train named Niklas Kronwall caught Havlat with his head down and knocked him into next winter.

You would think the Hawks, even after winning Friday, are in a very tough spot now.

But strange cats they are, these young players, and by our count they haven't used up but half their nine lives.

brozner@dailyherald.com