Here’s the thing that makes hockey different from baseball or basketball, everyone who suits up for the game is going to make a difference in said game, positively or negatively. When it’s playoff hockey, the difference is magnified ten-fold. So when Joel Quenneville decided to dress John Scott in the most important game of the season, I simply don’t see how it can be greeted with a shrug of the shoulders or a smile.
The trickle down of Scott dressing effects the entire line-up. Not only does it mean the Hawks have a slug on their fourth line who is incapable of doing anything, it also means their top wingers are getting double-shifted throughout the game making them doubly tired should they be chasing a lead. Patrick Kane should not be skating 26 minutes in a non-overtime game. Ben Smith, for the love of all things holy, cannot be skating 20 minutes in any type of NHL game.
Basically, dressing Scott forces the Hawks, by their own hand, to skate with one less player. If this is too difficult to comprehend, I don’t know how else to explain it.