No time to relax during Stanley Cup playoffs

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When it was over, he looked like he should have showered before meeting the media.

It might at least have given the impression that Chicago Blackhawks goaltender Corey Crawford had broken a sweat during Tuesday's ludicrously effortless 7-2 victory over the Vancouver Canucks.

Roberto Luongo, on the other hand, was still popping beads on his forehead when he met briefly with the media to talk about the six goals he had let in at the other end before being yanked in favour of backup Cory Schneider. The duty talk done, he finished dressing and hurried through the basement corridor of the United Center with the look of a man worried he had left his bank card stuck in an ATM machine.

Such are the vagaries of momentum. You're up; you're down. You're in control; you're spinning out of control. Cheers can switch to boos quicker than line shifts in a game where, perhaps more than any other, bounces are every bit the equal of skill and strategy.

"The game of hockey is very easy," the late great Carl Brewer used to say. "It's the thinking that makes it hard."

Thinking … off days … and repeated media questions that invite an admission of self-doubt.

The two Canadian teams in the 2011 Stanley Cup playoffs, the Montreal Canadiens and Vancouver Canucks, found themselves in somewhat similar situations Wednesday. The Canucks, up three games to none against Chicago, and seemingly on cruise control to the Stanley Cup final, forgot the easy part, playing, and fell victim to the hard part, thinking. They thought they had it, and by assuming the Blackhawks were toast they burned themselves with poor defensive decisions, lacklustre checking, neglected attack and, yes, spotty goaltending by Luongo as they watched, seemingly helpless, as momentum shifted from one bench to the other.

As for the Canadiens, up two games to none against a team that had everything going for it but confidence, they let arrogance rule and paid the price often paid for that in the game of hockey: they were outworked, outplayed and ultimately outscored 4-2 by the Boston Bruins.

While Montreal's loss to Boston was hardly as dramatic as Vancouver's loss to Chicago, it had equal effect. The Blackhawks are the defending Stanley Cup champions, and having become used to swaggering less than a year ago it could easily return, despite the very real odds of being down three-games-to-one heading to Vancouver for Game 5.

Boston, on the other hand, is still dealing with a crisis of confidence delivered a year ago by the Philadelphia Flyers. The Flyers were not only down three games to none against the Bruins but then fell behind 3-0 in the Game 7 they had forced, only to come back all the way and eliminate a Boston team that seemed certain to move on.

That remarkable comeback - marking a standard reached only twice before in the NHL, by the 1975 New York Islanders and the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs - has come to play a significant role in the spring of 2011. It inspired the Hawks in Chicago; it worries the Habs in Montreal.

Given this sense of Sisyphus actually rolling his puck all the way up the hill - a possibility set in motion last year by the Flyers and openly embraced this week by both Chicago and Boston - there is an unease at work these days that makes off-days all but unbearable for hockey players.

The endless and repeated questions from the media hordes gnaw into the bravado of those who lost their previous matches - even when it might be their only loss of a so-far-successful spring.

No wonder players and coaches resort to the meaningless clichés: just take it one game at a time, we can't control what we can't control. …

Or, as Luongo put it: "Keep our composure, not get too high or too low whether we win or lose. We'll forget about this one."

They might like to forget, but they aren't allowed to forget. Every question, every caller, every headline, every glance reminds them.

When Shakespeare called self-doubt the "traitors" we carry within ourselves, he knew what he was talking about. Perhaps he played for the Stratford-upon-Avon Sharks, who knows?

Just look at the Montreal-Boston series. Some sloppy play by the skaters, a couple of miscues by usually sparkling goaltender Carey Price, and here is the Bruins' Mark Recchi speaking to media at the team's Lake Placid retreat on Wednesday: "It's all about believing … believing what we've done all year. Believing in each other. It's what it's all about"

Little wonder Roberto Luongo moved quickly to distance himself from the natural questions being raised by the six goals he let in. "Good news is," he said, "I don't have to sit on it for five months before we get to play again. I'm not going to beat myself up about it."

The reference, unnecessary for Canucks fans, has to do with Luongo's failure to succeed in the playoffs even though he has undoubtedly established himself among the premier goaltenders in the game and only a year ago backstopped Canada to the gold medal in the Vancouver Olympic Games.

No matter how good he is - and at times Tuesday night he was exceptionally good, despite the score - he has yet to convince that he has what it takes. And there is nothing like a day off after a loss to bring all that up again - for example, right here.

Chicago players were quick to claim they had the "momentum" now, even though the record plainly shows that Vancouver has won three games and Chicago one.

And yet the Canucks players had to speak as if the reverse were so.

"We've just got to stay confident," said Mikael Samuelsson. "We're a good team in here. Just believe, and relax a little bit."

Relax? Sorry, but it's just not possible when the Stanley Cup playoffs are on the line.

Not after what happened last year to Boston.