HockeyHawks favoured to end 49-year dry spell

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Stanley Cup final preview

Here is a glance at the storylines and statistics for the Stanley Cup final as well as predictions from CBCSports.ca's CBCSports.ca's Jeff Marek, Scott Morrison and Tim Wharnsby.

(2) Chicago (52-22-8, 112 points) vs. (7) Philadelphia (41-35-6, 88 points)

The skinny: The two teams have met in the playoffs, only once previously. Then-goalie Tony Esposito and the Blackhawks swept Bobby Clarke and the Flyers in four games in the 1970-71 quarter-finals ... The Flyers are trying to end a 35-year Stanley Cup drought, while Chicago currently has the longest dry spell at 49 years ... Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews, 22, and his Philadelphia counterpart Mike Richards, 25, played on the same line for the gold-medal winning Canadian Olympic team ... The last final that featured captains this young was in 1975, when a 25-year-old Clarke and the Flyers bested a 22-year-old Jim Schoenfeld and the Buffalo Sabres in six games ... Other Canadian Olympians facing off are defencemen Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook on the Chicago side and Flyers veteran Chris Pronger ... Only three players have won Olympic gold and the Stanley Cup in the same season: Ken Morrow (U.S.-N.Y. Islanders, 1980), Steve Yzerman (Canada-Detroit, 2002) and Brendan Shanahan (Canada-Detroit, 2002) ... Toews has a 13-game point streak, the longest since Eric Staal's 15-gamer in 2006 ... Philadelphia goalie Michael Leighton was drafted by the Blackhawks in the sixth round in 1999. He made his NHL debut for Chicago in 2002-03, making eight appearances ...

The Flyers have 16 Canadians who have played in at last one playoff game this spring, compared to 15 for Chicago. The Blackhawks likely will have 13 in the lineup for the series opener, one fewer than Philadelphia's 14 ... This is the third time in five years Pronger has made it to the Stanley Cup final in his first season with a new team. He was there in 2006 with Edmonton and the next season with Anaheim ... Chicago's Marian Hossa is making his third consecutive appearance in the final with a third different team after losing with Detroit last spring and Pittsburgh in 2008 ... Flyers forward Ian Laperriere is making his first appearance in the final after 1,144 combined regular season and playoff games over 16 seasons. The only active players with more total games without winning a championship are Montreal's Roman Hamrlik (1,322) and Minnesota's Owen Nolan (1,265) ...

Flyers coach Peter Laviolette replaced John Stevens on Dec. 4. He is the eighth mid-season replacement head coach to advance to the final. Of course, Pittsburgh's Dan Bylsma was the latest to takeover a team and win the championship last year ... Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville has a Stanley Cup ring as an assistant on Marc Crawford's staff when the Colorado Avalanche won the 1995-96 Stanley Cup. But nobody has coached in and won more playoff games without advancing to the final than Quenneville. He's 63-57 in the post-season ... The Flyers have the lowest goals against average in the 2010 playoffs at 2.12. The Blackhawks are second at 2.50 ... Philadelphia has the second-best penalty killing unit (67 of 77) in the playoffs and Chicago (59 of 67) has been third best in man-short situations.

Season series: In an entertaining game, the Flyers rallied for a 3-2 victory over the Blackhawks in a matinee affair at the Wachovia Center on March 13. The game was goal-less through two periods but there was plenty of end-to-end action. Simon Gagne gave the Flyers a early third-period lead, only to see Chicago's Kris Versteeg and Marian Hossa put the Blackhawks in front. In the final three minutes Scott Hartnell tied the game and Chris Pronger won it off the rush with 2.1 seconds left to play. Leighton made 39 saves in the game. This dramatic win snapped the Flyers out of their post-Olympic funk.

CBCSports.ca's predictions:

Jeff Marek - Hawks in 6.
Scott Morrison - Hawks in 5.
Tim Wharnsby - Flyers in 7.

Overall records:

Jeff Marek - 9-5.
Scott Morrison - 7-7.
Tim Wharnsby - 7-7.

 

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