With nary a single Stanley Cup championship in the last 40 years, a drought stretching all the way back to the 1960-61 season, the Chicago Blackhawks are certainly the most frustrated of the "Original Six" NHL teams.

Season No. 75, their diamond anniversary, arrives for the 2000-2001 season, along with the never-ending hope of the Chicago faithful that maybe, just maybe, this will be the year the "Curse II" finally ends.

Not unlike the so-called "Red Dutton Curse" that allegedly haunted the New York Rangers for more than half a century, Chicagoans once had their very own "curse," although one that is not even remotely related to the Blackhawks' current drought.

Chicago's original whammy was called the "Curse of Muldoon." Pete Muldoon was Chicago's first coach back in 1926-27, the Hawks' maiden NHL campaign. Despite finishing third in their division and in the Stanley Cup playoffs, Muldoon was summarily fired after the playoffs by Chicago's owner, Major Frederick McLaughlin, who thought the Hawks should have finished first.

A feisty Irishman, Muldoon promptly proclaimed the Blackhawks a jinxed club that would never win, and never finish first in his lifetime. They never did, not for 41 years, which is plenty long enough for any "curse," real or imagined. Buy Chicago Blackhawks Tickets.