Also Brandon Bolig... but the key difference is always clear in 2012, 2014, 2016, etc. Why they were worse those years was depth.
When Jamal mayers or Carrillo types would play more than 5 games. That meant Kane is being double shifted and less useful. Your depth lines are eating your matchups. Kane had the beautiful OT goal in 2016 and that series multiple OTs, but Kane played an Insane amount, which is never connected to winning. Across the board, years teams win cups vs loss, you see a medium or lesser playing time by stars than years they lost. Because you are more likely to win if you have depth to carry you.
Depth and coaching were issues, but truthfully, the biggest issues the Blackhawks had that series was that three key pieces under performed.
Seabrook, Oduya and particularly Sharp vastly underperformed in that series. Sharp was bounced to the 3rd line, and for good reason. After one of (if not the) best regular seasons of his career, he was quite bad that playoffs.
Likewise for Seabrook and Oduya.
I have a lot of issues with how Q handled the depth in the lineup that year and those playoffs, but I sympathize with having to hide 2 dmen you can usually count on and losing a weapon that's been pretty consistent for you in the past. Overrelying on Rozsvial was NOT what I would have done, but it's still not an ideal situation.
Sharp was really never the same after that 2014 RS. He was pretty mid in 2015 RS and 2015 playoffs as well. A friend of mine suggested his confidence got shot from his time on Team Canada, where he was relegated to 13th forward that rarely dressed.
In 2015, they cleared out Q's boys (Handzus and Bollig), Versteeg's knee got a bit better and he actually warranted being played, plus they added better options like Vermette, Teuvo and Richards into the mix that helped balance out Sharp's decline. And even then, the 2015 team won more through sheer will than dominance.
