Jason's Take

Longtime play-by-play man Pat Foley always says the Blackhawks' Thanksgiving road trip is a good measuring stick for what type of season the team is going to have. This year's late November road swing will be as difficult as any, taking the Hawks to Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, San Jose, Anaheim and Los Angeles over an 11-day period.

Tough as that trip sounds, it sure got off to a good start Thursday night as the Hawks pounded lumps on Calgary 7-1. Mind you, this is a quality Flames team that entered tonight's action with the exact same record as the Hawks -- 12-5-2.

But the Hawks were ready to go from the very start, and their power play turned out to be the difference. It's about time. If there's one criticism I've had of the Blackhawks in the early going this season it would be that they haven't been very good with the man advantage.

Entering Thursday's game, the Hawks ranked 19th in the league, 13-for-72 overall for just over an 18 percent success rate. On the recent homestand, the power play showed signs of perking up. The Hawks scored three goals with the extra man in four games, all wins. The power play provided game-winning tallies in victories over Los Angeles and Toronto.

However, the real breakthrough occurred Thursday night, as the Hawks went a dazzling 4-for-5 on the power play. Kris Versteeg (pictured) scored twice, and Patrick Kane and Troy Brouwer also lit the lamp.

A key sequence came late in the second period. With Calgary already short-handed, Flames defenseman Dion Phaneuf got in a fight with Blackhawks defenseman Brent Seabrook. Meathead Phaneuf picked up an extra minor penalty. The Hawks got a two-man advantage and netted two power play goals in the final 1:14 of the period to turn a 4-1 lead into an insurmountable 6-1 advantage. That's how you put a team away.

The Hawks are 1-0 on the trip, and on any long road swing, it's easier to get points early than late -- when jet lag sets in and legs get a little tired. Up next for the Hawks: a Saturday night contest against Edmonton and former teammate Nikolai Khabibulin.

Sorry, Bob Costas. You don't get to talk to Jerry Angelo, Lovie Smith or Jay Cutler this week.

Smith, Cutler and other players will be available Friday for off-air meetings with NBC announcers Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth, but the Bears have denied Costas access to team personnel for on-air interviews for the network's pregame show prior to the start of Sunday night's game against the Philadelphia Eagles.

Sun-Times columnist Rick Telander thinks Cutler is behind the snub and blasted him for his silence today. To me, that's a bit of a reach. If Cutler didn't want to talk to the press at all, he probably would have boycotted his typical Wednesday afternoon press conference. Cutler did address the media yesterday.

Frankly, I don't care if the Bears are refusing to give on-air interviews. Why would Costas or anybody else want to interview Lovie Smith anyway? I could already tell him what Lovie would say: "We are one quarter of the way through the third quarter of our football season. There's still a lot of football left to be played."

Thank you, Lovie.

It would be nice, though, if the Bears would resemble a professional football team Sunday night. They are 0-3 in prime-time games this season entering this contest with Philadelphia. Interestingly, the Eagles are 0-7 all-time on NBC's Sunday Night Football.

Something's gotta give! Can you feel the excitement?

Fighting Illini fans, meet Brandon Paul (pictured). He was Mr. Basketball in the state of Illinois as a senior at Warren High School in Gurnee last year. And he's poised to make a bigger impact on the Illinois basketball program than any other freshman since Dee Brown arrived in Champaign in 2002.

Yeah, it's early, but it's been pretty hard to miss Paul out on the court in Illinois' first two games. He scored 22 in a season-opening win over SIU-Edwardsville and tossed in 20 more in last night's victory over Northern Illinois. Paul was the leading scorer in both games. The 22 points represented a new school record for a freshman making his debut. The old record of 21 was held by Deon Thomas, who is leading scorer in the history of the Illinois program.

And Paul isn't the only freshman to watch out for at Illinois this year. Guard D.J. Richardson, who hails from Peoria, is going to be heard from, too. Richardson had 14 points against SIUE and five points against NIU. While he didn't score much last night, Richardson impacted the game by making a steal and pass to Demetri McCamey for a dunk that stopped an NIU run and started an Illinois run in the second half.

As an Illinois alum, it's kind of nice to have some freshmen enter the program who are generating some excitement right away. It's been awhile. Take a look at the previous freshman classes during the Bruce Weber era:

2003-04: Brian Randle, Warren Carter, Rich McBride
Comment: The three guys from Bill Self's last recruiting class eventually became starters at Illinois, but none averaged more than 3.2 points per game as freshman.

2004-05: Calvin Brock, Shaun Pruitt
Comment: Brock redshirted. Pruitt should have. Both had a front-row seat on the bench for the Illini's run to the Final Four.

2005-06: Chester Frazier, C.J. Jackson, Jamar Smith
Comment: Smith made the All-Freshman team by averaging 8.0 points per game, but then alcohol problems and a car crash ruined his career at Illinois. Frazier developed into a defensive ace as an upperclassman, but made little impact as a freshman. Jackson was a non-factor during his Illini career.

2006-07: Brian Carlwell, Rich Semrau
Comment: Carlwell was never a factor at Illinois, and he eventually transferred after being severely injured as a passenger in Smith's alcohol-related car crash. Semrau, now a redshirt junior, is still struggling to find minutes.

2007-08: Demetri McCamey, Mike Tisdale, Mike Davis, Jeff Jordan
Comment: With time, this has become a pretty good class. All these guys are now juniors, and there are three current Illinois starters here. McCamey averaged 8.2 points per game as a freshmen. The others needed some time to figure it out. Davis has a chance to average a double-double if he applies himself on the boards this year.

2008-09: Stan Simpson
Comment: After taking a redshirt year, Simpson is still unlikely to crack the rotation this season.

In conclusion, Illinois has had two impact freshmen over the last six years: Smith and McCamey. This year, they'll equal that with Paul and Richardson. The two other freshmen this season, Tyler Griffey and Joseph Bertrand, should be contributors sometime down the road.

Kinda refreshing to have a couple potential stars joining the Illini program, isn't it?

Bears fans might have thought they'd heard the last of Rex Grossman, but good ol' Rexy was back in the news Tuesday. Well, actually, Grossman's father, Dan, made front-page headlines in the Chicago Tribune with comments critical of the Bears organization in a column written by Fred Mitchell.

To say the least, the elder Grossman's comments were candid and expansive. Cutting to the chase, here are some snippets of what I found interesting:

"It's a self-perpetuating problem that is not Jay Cutler's fault," Dan Grossman said. "It's not Rex Grossman's fault. It's not Kyle Orton's fault. It's not every other quarterback who has been through the system's fault. It's the fault of the organization for not understanding what a quarterback needs.

"What's amazing to me is, here we go again with Jay Cutler. He came in and he was going to be the franchise quarterback and lead the Bears. I heard some people say they were going to the Super Bowl this year. And here we are, back in the situation where .. because the team is not really built around a passing game, he has struggled. I don't really blame it on Jay Cutler."

I agree with Mr. Grossman. I don't blame it on Jay Cutler either. Here are some more comments that I agree with:

"I believe that the NFL is a passing league," Grossman told Mitchell. "It has been for the last 20 years. Chicago continues to use the phrase, at least Lovie Smith continues to use the phrase, 'We get off the bus running.' They need to abandon that concept. Running is obviously a very important part of the offense. But the best teams in this league are prolific passing teams.

"And for a team to be effective at passing, in my opinion, you have to build your offense around your quarterback. You have to commit to the quarterback: 'You're our guy.'

"You don't bring your quarterback in and say: 'We're going to get off the bus running. But on third-and-10, you've got to come through for us now!'"

All this actually cuts right to the heart of a newsroom conversation I was having last night with my colleagues Brad Engel and Jim Owczarski. We were saying that the Bears are years behind the times. Jim correctly pointed out that the NFL wants passing and prolific offense. They want you to chuck the ball all over the field. The rules are set up to favor great quarterbacks and passing teams. The Bears are still stuck in the 1950s with their run-first offensive philosophy. Forget about quarterbacks for a second. When have the Bears ever had an elite wide receiver?

I thought Troy Aikman made a good point about the Bears a couple weeks ago when he said that for the longest time, people said "If only the Bears could just get a quarterback..." Well, now they do have a quarterback and all the other warts and bankrupt philosophies of the team are being exposed.

There's been a lot of talk of firing coach Lovie Smith lately. Well, if you fire Smith, you have to ship GM Jerry Angelo out the door with him. Angelo is the one who has had multiple bad drafts, given too much money to aging defensive players, ignored the needs at receiver and failed to address the subpar offensive line.

Moreover, if Smith is fired sometime soon, the Bears need to hire an offensive coach for a change. Look at the last three guys that have come through here -- Dave Wannstedt, Dick Jauron and Smith. All those guys were defensive coordinators with no head coaching experience. They all came cheap (at first).

Another defensive guru won't be the answer for the Bears. It's time to get an offensive-minded guy to help Cutler out. Then, you gotta get Cutler the weapons he needs. It's looking more and more to me like an overhaul is needed. It's going to be a tough road for the Bears here in the short term. That much is for certain.

In NBA news, I see the Memphis Grizzlies have decided to part ways with guard Allen Iverson. (How many Grizzlies are there in Memphis? Just asking.) Iverson apparently didn't want to come off the bench and didn't want to play on a rebuilding team that features young players like O.J. Mayo, Rudy Gay and Hasheem Thabeet.

Iverson began an indefinite leave of absence from the team on Nov. 7 to deal with "personal matters." The guess here is those personal matters included not starting, not getting enough shots and playing for a losing team. We already know Iverson doesn't like to practice. This press conference remains one of my all-time favorites:

If you need further proof that sportswriters have no idea what the hell they are talking about, I submit to you the results of the American League Rookie of the Year voting.

Let's look over the season White Sox third baseman Gordon Beckham produced, shall we? He led all American League rookies with 28 doubles, 43 extra-base hits, 28 multihit games and 63 RBIs. He was second among American League rookies in on-base percentage (.347), slugging percentage (.460), home runs (14), runs (58), hits (102) and total bases (174).

In other words, Beckham was first or second among rookies in almost every offensive category worth mentioning. And he accomplished all that while learning a new position.

The Sporting News and the Major League Baseball Players Association both recognized Beckham as the obvious choice for American League Rookie of the Year.

Of course, The Sporting News award is voted upon by a panel of 338 major league players. The MLBPA award is also voted upon by players, who presumably know how tough it is to put up good offensive numbers while learning a new position at the big-league level.

The baseball writers? Well, they voted Beckham fifth, behind Andrew Bailey, Elvis Andrus, Rick Porcello and Jeff Niemann. In fact, Beckham did not receive a single first-place vote. Idiots. No wonder most baseball players hate the media.

High school basketball season is coming. We're about 10 days away from tipoff for local teams. Unfortunately, I'm sad to report that we will not be producing a preseason basketball issue this year.

Nevertheless, we'll have eight straight days of basketball previews in our print edition, starting this Sunday, Nov. 15. If you're not a print subscriber, we'll have everything covered at beaconnewsonline.com. Be sure to check it out and see how things are shaking up for your local team this season.