I'd have to dig deep to know for sure, but somewhere, tucked away in a dresser or a box, there's a ticket to a Chicago Blackhawks Stanley Cup Playoff semifinal game that year which is so chiseled into my brain, it feels like yesterday.
Youngins, meet Ed Belfour, a Hall of Fame NHL netminder who was something to behold.
He was fit for the Old Chicago Stadium (You know, the original Madhouse on Madison?) like peanut butter goes with jelly, or like yin goes with yang.
In 17 NHL seasons, the man we knew as "The Eagle" appeared in 963 games. He compiled 484 regular season wins, had 320 losses and 125 ties or overtime/shootout losses. Belfour also posted 76 shutouts.
That's just the start.
In his rookie season of 1990-91, Belfour led the league in wins (43), games played (74), goals against average (2.47), saves (1713) and save percentage (.910). He captured the Calder, Vezina and Jennings Trophies, and would later lead the Hawks to the Stanley Cup Finals against the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1992. And he did some of this, until 1994 when the Hawks moved to the United Center, lest we forget, on a sheet of ice half the time that was smaller in size than the NHL rinks in use today.
Go look it up, friends.
Back to those playoffs I mentioned earlier. It's where Belfour was unlike any goaltender I have ever seen.
It was May 8, 1996, to be exact.
http://www.hockey-reference.com/boxscores/199605080CHI.html
The Hawks were in conference semifinals against the Colorado Avalanche and goalie Patrick Roy, who by the way, now owns the second most regular season wins in NHL history, with 551. Guess who -- yep Belfour -- is third all-time, with 484.
For 60, then 80, then 100 minutes, these two men went head-to-head the way Ali-Foreman did, the way Magic and Bird used to. These games, back then, they never got they hype other sports did.
Save after ridiculous save, by the time they got to the second overtime, not only was my voice gone, but my nerves were shot. Literally.
Belfour made 54 saves that night. The more he made, the more the crowd roared. Trademark chants of Ed-die, Ed-die ripped through the very same rafters guys like Kane, Toews, Crawford and Niemi have since made famous. The majority of saves were of the ridiculous variety against a team (Colorado) loaded with Hall-of-Fame worthy talent.
Do I have your attention now?
Belfour, folks, was far better than both Crawford or Niemi. His Butterfly style of goaltending was not only breathtaking and spectacular at times, but his cat-like reflexes and longevity, he often said, came from his affinity for training for triathlons.
And even though he only donned a Chicago Blackhawks jersey for seven-and-a-half-seasons, he posted a 35-28 postseason record while in Chicago alone, including three shutouts. Belfour played until age 41, compiling 88 total postseason wins, 14 of which were shutouts.
He was inducted into the NHL Hall of Fame in 2011. His defining moment came when he won a Stanley Cup with the Dallas Stars in 1999. Belfour then lost in the finals the following season.
Belfour's lone crime? He didn't win a Stanley Cup with the Hawks.
He probably should have, which is why I keep referring to that night.
Because you see, Belfour's destiny, for better or worse, is forever linked to that of one of his teammates that night, Jeremy Roenick.
Roenick, a center who donned the number 27 on his Indian Head jersey, almost won the game for the Hawks that fateful night, May 8 ... and 9th ... 1996.
In the second overtime, with the Hawks leading Colorado 2-1 in the series, the game tied 2-2, Roenick had a breakaway.
In the NHL playoffs, however, especially in the 1980s and 90s, referees would let your own mother steal $20 from you and not blow the whistle on her, so long as she were in overtime.
As Roenick raced across the blue line with a burst of adrenaline, several strides ahead of the nearest Colorado defender, myself and 20,000 other Hawks fans rose from their seats. You can bet your ass there wasn't a person there who didn't think Roenick was about to finish.
He was the Patrick Kane of our time, for lack of a better comparison. The one guy who when he touched the puck, electricity suddenly would engulf the building.
I don't recall who the defenseman was. But from that moment on, I never forgave the Colorado Avalanche. Roenick was blatantly tripped to the ice, and instead of a penalty shot giving the Hawks a chance to go up 3-1 in the series, the officials said "play on."
Below is video of that moment, clear as day. Does this look like it should've been a penalty shot to you? It wasn't, or so said the officials.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pW1aSTmwrOE
Boos ripped through the United Center for parts of the remainder of the period. Not at the Hawks, but at the inexplicable no-call. I feel like I'm still there as I type this, even.
Then, 4:33 into the third overtime --- the following morning now, at 1:30 a.m., a man named Joe Sakic broke my heart.
He scored a soft goal, of all things, between the legs of Belfour, tying the series, 2-2.
The Avalanche won the next two games after that, then the Stanley Cup.
Heartbreak for years, for this Hawks fan.
Because the following year, the Hawks chased Belfour out of town, trading him to San Jose for Jeff Hackett and Ulf Dahlen, I believe, never to be seen or heard from again locally, or so it seems.
And it's a damned shame.
Soon thereafter, we have the trading of Roenick to the Phoenix Coyotes for Alex Zhamnov, and the dismantling of what could've been a Hawks dynasty, with guys like Chris Chelios, Gary Suter and other now NHL legends left hung out to dry on Chicago's roster at the time.
When Hawks fans nowadays look back and wonder why there are so many stories about how the Hawks franchise almost collapsed in the early 2000s, this is the epicenter of where it all began.
Which is significant because the contributions of Roenick in a Hawks jersey from 1988-1996 were stunning. He's the last Blackhawks' player to score 50 or more goals in a season, a feat he accomplished with Chicago in both the 1991-92 (53 goals) and 1992-93 (51 goals) seasons. He followed that up with a 46-goal season in 1993-94, which was also his third consecutive 100-plus point campaign.
Roenick not only averaged more than a point per game as a Blackhawk, but also racked up 513 career goals and 703 assists in 1363 career games. In 82 playoff games in a Chicago uniform, Roenick tallied eight game-winning goals, while notching 122 total points in 154 career postseason games with four teams.
Incredibly, 15.8 percent of all shots Roenick took throughout his career found the back of the net, a staggering number given how often this man was in scoring position. He had 20 career short-handed goals, and a whopping 92 regular season game-winning tallies.
Yet he wasn't selfish, on or off the ice. He's 50th all-time with those 703 assists, and was well-known for always making time for kids. One time, during an NHL strike in the 1990s, I encountered Roenick, who had achieved rock star status, at a Chicago Wolves minor league hockey game.
As I approached Roenick, a bodyguard stepped in front of me. J.R., as he was known by us Hawks fans, pushed the bodyguard aside.
"Yes, young man?" Roenick said, before signing my Hawks jersey then rubbing the hair on my head.
I was starstruck. All the rumors I'd read at the time were true. He was at a Wolves game, right in front of my adolescent eyes.
For those of us who followed hockey at the time, seeing Roenick in such a public setting made him an "everyman" in the eyes of Chicago sports fans.
Which may have also been part of why he was unpopularly traded under former iron-fisted owner Bill Wirtz, as well-founded rumors had Roenick potentially fleeing to those same Wolves during a 1990s lockout. It was bad for business in an era when Wirtz refused to even televise Hawks home games.
Like Belfour, Roenick's only crime?
He didn't win a Stanley Cup with the Hawks.
Looking back, that night was the beginning of the end. That May 8, or should I say May 9, 1996.
Two careers linked to one moment, that triple overtime loss which I still contend, changed Chicago Blackhawks history forever.
Ed Belfour and Jeremy Roenick weren't Chicago Blachhawks for life for one reason alone, and that was the elder Wirtz and his stubbornness.
He was a businessman, not a hand-shaker.
But with time, comes perspective. There are six Blackhawks with their jerseys retired.
It's time we stop punishing the fact these two men, who epitomized what it meant to be a Chicago Blackhawk and NHL superstars, for the fact they were disliked by their owner at the time. Who forced both out of town over kneejerk reactions to situations that I still don't understand fully to this day.
Much like I call the Cubs out for needing to change their culture because of things like billy goats, cats, the '03 Marlins (I'm not using his name, give it a rest for a while) and nonsense like that, I too, am taking the Hawks to task and asking them.
Why aren't the numbers of Ed Belfour, #30, and Jeremy Roenick, #27, retired and resting in the United Center rafters?
When the Hawks won the Cup in 2010, on national TV, Roenick cried. Take a look. It's enough to make this Chicago fan tear up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vfo5xSAnfo
The man wanted more than anything not just to win a Stanley Cup, but to win it in Chicago. He was and still is, like Belfour, Chicago Blackhawk hockey, personified.
In this world, we are lucky in that we often have the chance to right our wrongs. Put the past away, Hawks. Your grudges, your disagreements. And if there are no longer any, all the more reason to invite these gentlemen back.
These men were among the best not just to ever don your red, white and black sweaters, but among the best players of all-time.
Do the right thing, Hawks. It's time.
