Fine. I’ll admit it. I can’t stay mad at the Chicago Blackhawks. At the same time, I’m now too invested in the Sharks to give them up. So what’s a man to do?

Two teams. The answer is two teams. I’m a fan of both teams now, because they’re both good (or SHOULD BE) and I’ll be moving to the West Coast soon, but my roots are in the Blackhawks. So SharkHawks is how I define my fandom. That’s why we’re now Sharks and Hawks colors.

And yet, despite my new love for both teams, today they seemed on a mission to hurt me.

Detroit and Toronto are not (or should not be) playoff teams. And yet, San Jose lost to Detroit, and Chicago lost to Toronto. Why?

Well, I have answers of course. The Blackhawks are having growing pains. With six rookies, the Hawks have made some mistakes. And the thing is, it’s not been the rookies making the mistakes. The new players (I say this for the sake of Dick Panik, who is playing his first full season in Chicago) are great. I like Tyler Motte, Ryan Hartman, and Dick Panik a lot. If I had a Crawford jersey I’d be getting a Hartman jersey like now.

But it’s the veterans screwing up. Kane, Toews, Anisimov, Panarin, none of them have been great this season. That needs to change if the Blackhawks are going to the playoffs. Because yes, it’s early. Yes, it’s the regular season. But right now, the Blackhawks playoff potential, at least for me, is in doubt.

And the defense is not escaping blame. Where the fuck has Duncan Keith been offensively? After being snubbed for the Norris, he should be out there proving himself, and he’s really not. The biggest growing pains are on the back end. The only returning full-time defensemen are Keith, Seabrook, and Hjammer. That’s because both Kempny and Forsling are better players than TVR. But that doesn’t mean they’ve been perfect.

Corey Crawford has a .975 5on5 save percentage. That’s insane. He’s really good again this year. And yet it drops to like the 600s during penalty kill. So who do we blame for that? The guy who should have gotten a Vezina nom or the PK unit in front of him? Hint: it’s the latter.

Veterans need to be better if the Hawks are going to be better this season. Stop relying on rookies, and make a play *cough* JONATHON TOEWS *cough*.

On the other side, the Sharks took far too many penalties against the Red Wings. Their discipline needs to go up.

Their offense was lacking against a not great Red Wings defense. This Sharks offense has a lot of potency, and yet they’ve been getting shut down recently.

But it’s that defense that sunk the game. They gave Martin Jones no help, and that’s gotta change heading into the future.

Alright. Rants over. Play better teams. I like both of you now, so please stop trying to mutually break my heart. I also look forward to (potentially, if both STEP IT UP) having to choose a side in the Western Conference Finals.

Cause Pekka Rinne is not taking the Predators there. Not this version of Rinne.