Murray Craven was not totally unfamiliar with playing the point on the power play as he was called on to do Thursday night. Craven said he sometimes played the role, unusual for a forward, until defenseman Jeff Brown joined the Vancouver Canucks last year.
“You have to be pretty responsible back there,” Craven said. “You don’t want a power play situation turned into a goal against you.”
Craven was replacing defenseman Gary Suter, out with a broken hand, on a power play that had failed to produce on 44 of 48 occasions in the first two rounds of the playoffs–but which scored against Detroit in the first period Thursday night.
“Until recently we were going great guns,” observed Craven. “It doesn’t take much to turn it around. A couple of goals and we’ll get our confidence back. We’ve got to produce on the power play against this team. If we don’t, it will be double difficult.”
Just in case: Sergei Krivokrasov, who did not play in the Vancouver series, skated with the regulars Thursday morning as a precaution in the event that Brent Sutter could not go. Sutter, who was running a fever, stayed back in the hotel, but was in the lineup Thursday night.
Team logo: The Red Wings may have their octopus, but the Blackhawks have their Indian heads. A string of eight of the team’s logos is pasted on the back of the locker room door in the United Center, representing the eight victories so far in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Defenseman Steve Smith, keeper of the decals, says it’s a tradition he learned from the Edmonton Oilers. “It’s just a little carrot for the guys after we win a game,” Smith says. “In Edmonton, we used the Oilers’ logo until the end of the line and then we pasted a picture of the Stanley Cup there.
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“Normally, whoever scores the game-winning goal gets to put up the next logo, but the guys are superstitious and I put the first one up and they didn’t want to change it.”