The Blackhawks may have all the momentum but the Canucks are still in control of the series.
CHICAGO -- Respect is just not what it used to be.
From the Versus analyst who called the Vancouver Canucks "gutless" on Thursday night, to the people who comment at the bottom of this space, no one cares about whether you racked up 117 points during the season, or what your track record is as a sports columnist.
It's all about the here and now in 2011. And remember Keith Jones' game.
If anyone should be able to sling around the term "gutless," it is Jones.
As an objective observer, we tend to respect the fact that this is a fine team, with more major trophy winners and candidates like the Sedin brothers and Ryan Kesler, who will find a way to right this ship over the next few days.
Roberto Luongo, perhaps the most maligned goaltender ever to backstop his team to an Olympic gold medal, may have momentarily lost his game. But he's more than capable of reclaiming it.
Most obvious, to us anyhow, is that this is a group that has paid its dues. The Canucks have learned the hard way, by losing in the post-season repeatedly. Frankly, they should be experts in dealing with adversity.
If the bet is whether or not a team of this pedigree can figure itself out and win one of the next two games, I know where my money is going.
"We've been through adversity before and this is more adversity," said Daniel Sedin, "This is when we show what type of team we are."
Those words, of course, are a double-edged sword. But for now, they are what a leader is supposed to say and what a dressing room should be hearing.
We're not hiding from the fact the Canucks have been awful since taking a 3-0 series lead. Or, by extension, there is a good team down the hall that knows a thing or two about survival, having won the Stanley Cup last season.
It is the playoffs. It's not going to be easy.
The irony is that the people who have seen this team the most - Canucks fans - are some of the first to lose faith.
"The key is we have to stay composed here," Luongo said after a disastrous Game 5, marking only the second time since 2008 that he was pulled in back-to-back starts.
"Obviously you don't want to be caught in these situations, but we have to take a deep breath here. Relax a little bit. I think it's a good thing we have a couple of days here to regroup as a team."
We don't buy for a moment that a city's collective anxiety has any effect on how its team plays; that 40 years of underachieving shapes what happens on the ice in 2011.
That assertion is as absurd as the incessant West Coast conspiracy theories, the purveyors of whom have not been heard since Raffi Torres was spared suspension, and Kevin Bieksa was not handed an instigator penalty despite initiating with Viktor Stalberg in the first fight of his young career, then pounding the daylights out of him.
Karma may even the score with Bieksa on that one but for now, destiny is still in Vancouver's possession.
Which would you rather be right now? Up 3-2 in the series, or down 3-2, trying to come all the way back from a 3-0 deficit?
I know who I would rather be this morning.
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