Farewell to the Chicago Blackhawks. The loss last night to the Blues in St. Louis puts an end to the Chicago Blackhawks dreams of repeating as Stanley Cup Champions. This brings the very disappointing 2015-16 NHL hockey season to a close for me. Following the elimination earlier in the week of the Los Angeles Kings, and the failure of both the Colorado Avalanche and Arizona Coyotes to make the playoffs, there are no more teams of interests for me to follow. I was debating whether or not to even renew my NHL Center Ice streaming subscription this year, but I went ahead and ordered it following a strong start out of the gate by the Coyotes. As the season was winding down, it really looked like the Chicago Blackhawks were not at the top of their game. I really thought that the Los Angeles Kings were the ones en route to another Stanley Cup title. During the final few weeks before the playoffs, the NHL released an update to their streaming media app. This update removed the condensed version of the game replays, which was actually what I watched the majority of the time.
I first started watching hockey when my dad took me and my brother to see Gordie Howe play with the Houston Aeros in the WHA. We were living in Houston at the time. When we moved to San Jose, he took us to some of the California Golden Seals NHL games at the old (but still active) Oakland Alameda County Coliseum. Those were the days when hockey was great! You didn’t have any players flopping to try and get a cheap penalty called. If they tried that, Dave “The Hammer” Schultz would have put a quick end to it. Now, with the condensed game function gone, the stupid shoot out (coin flip), silly 3 on 3 overtime, and other annoying rule changes implemented over the last few years, I think that the time has come for the sun to set on my NHL viewership. Even though I bid Farewell to the Chicago Blackhawks, I will probably still follow hockey. It will be the NCAA version of the sport, however. My wife and I got to attend a couple of DU games this year, and Arizona State will soon be joining the ranks of the college hockey elite. The Sun Devils are close to a final decision of which college hockey conference they will join. Click the link below for more college hockey info!
