Are the Penguins the 2017-18 Blackhawks?

Entering the 2017-18 season, the Chicago Blackhawks had ample reason to be optimistic. Only two seasons removed from their third Stanley Cup over a glorious six-year run, they’d won 50 games the season before.

Superstars Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews were 29 years old and in their respective primes. Although a touch long in the tooth, two-time Norris Trophy winner Duncan Keith and stay-at-home stud Brent Seabrook were still highly effective defensemen, buttressed by Corey Crawford, a two-time Jennings Trophy winner, between the pipes.

Power forward and Pittsburgh native Brandon Saad had returned following a two-year hiatus. The Hawks boasted a stable of rising young stars, including Nick Schmaltz, scrappy Ryan Hartman and pocket-sized sniper Alex DeBrincat, who’d go on to notch 28 goals as a rookie. Artem Anisimov and Patrick Sharp provided veteran depth.

Behind the bench…the dean of NHL coaches Joel Quenneville.

Oh, the team also featured a 27-year-old rookie defenseman out of Czechia named Jan Rutta.

Following an uneven start that included an uncharacteristic five-game losing streak, the Blackhawks appeared to right the ship with a five-game winning streak in December to run their record to a respectable 17-11-5.

Then disaster struck. Crawford, who’d been carrying the team (a sterling .929 save percentage), suffered a season-ending upper-body injury on December 23. The Hawks went 16-28-5 the rest of the way, snapping a run of nine-straight postseason appearances.

With the exception of a Covid induced “everybody gets in” postseason berth in 2020, the Hawks have missed the playoffs four of the past five seasons.

And now? With the worst record in the league, the Hawks are in complete teardown mode. A rebuild could take years…years. Although greatly diminished, Kane and Toews are still there (at least for now), a pair of twin 34-year-old pillars standing squarely amid the gutted ruins of a once-proud champion.

I look at the Hawks gradual fade-turned-cliff-dive and shudder. Does a similar apocalyptic fate await our beloved Penguins?

My heart pleads no but my gut screams yes.

We’re not playing good hockey right now. Indeed, we’re on a 0-4-2 losing jag, our second extended skid of the relatively young campaign.

A temporary glitch you say? My crystal ball says different.

With the exception of an occasional burst here and there, we’re no longer capable of playing the style of hockey that won us two Stanley Cups. The team’s aging, injuries are mounting and there isn’t enough organizational depth to patch the gaping holes. Indeed, with the possible exception of forwards Drew O’Connor, Filip Hallander and Valtteri Puustinen the immediate prospect cupboard is decidedly bare. There aren’t any future Sidney Crosbys or even Bryan Rusts on the way.

Worse yet, goalie Tristan Jarry, the driving force behind an early 15-3-2 hot streak, is out with a lower-body injury. Shades of Crawford in Chi-town.

It doesn’t paint a pretty picture, especially given the quality of competition in the murderous Metro and the Eastern Conference overall. Sharks are circling our tattered playoff aspirations from above (the ‘Canes, Devils, Capitals, Rangers and Islanders) and below (the improving Sabres). Even our heretofore sad-sack state mates, the Flyers, are gaining ground.

Jammed tight against the cap, GM Ron Hextall isn’t likely to swing an impact trade along the lines of the Jeff Carter and Rickard Rakell acquisitions of the past to lift the team out of the doldrums, at least not without sacrificing quality and/or draft picks in return.

What we have is pretty much what we have.

Again, it paints a grisly picture, for the immediate future but especially down the road. A fading team manacled to a collection of long-term contracts given to 30-something stars that I, for the record, was in favor of. All the while sliding toward our inexorable doom.

I close my eyes and glimpse Sid and Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang standing amid the rubble, just as Kane and Toews are in Chicago, the siren’s wail from Black Sabbath’s War Pigs providing the soundtrack for a bleak hockey future.