Playing three games in four days with a back-to-back included is hard enough; doing it against two of the top-five teams in the league, the Carolina Hurricanes and the Tampa Bay Lightning, plus the defending Stanley Cup champions, the Florida Panthers, is even tougher. The Blackhawks had to overcome that three-game obstacle, and they did an excellent job.
Back-to-Back Shootouts
The Blackhawks took the Hurricanes and the Lightning to a shootout. The first game of the back-to-back, the Hurricanes, was back and forth, mixed in with a fight. Oliver Moore wanted to stick up for Nick Lardis, who got hit, and took on Alexander Nikishin. It was both of their first fights, but Nikishin had the clear size advantage and promptly delivered three blows to Moore, just under his left eye.
However, Moore, on his 21st birthday, with a cut under his eye, went out onto the ice to score the possible game-winning goal in the shootout, and he did. Moore may have lost the battle, but in the end, he and the Blackhawks won the war, 4-3.
Chicago travelled back to the United Center the next night to host the Lightning. The Blackhawks have a history of performing poorly in the second half of a back-to-back. The most notable being Nov. 21 in Buffalo against the Sabres, when no one showed up, and Arvid Soderblom let in nine goals without much help from his skaters in a 9-3 loss.
Instead of coming out flat-footed, the captain, Nick Foligno, fought Jack Finley within the first couple of minutes of the first period, and defeated him; it wasn’t too hard to see who won the battle. The veteran got the best of the rookie. Having 20 fewer shots than Tampa Bay, the Blackhawks scored their first goal towards the end of the first frame as Ryan Greene continued to stay red-hot. Shortly after, though, Nikita Kucherov tied it up at one. The Blackhawks eventually fell to the Bolts in the shootout as former Hawk prospect Dominic James potted the game-winning goal.
The fact that the Blackhawks didn’t back down in the second game of the back-to-back and were able to sustain two 65-minute games in a row shows a lot of growth. At the beginning of the season, the team would just fold.
A Huge Three Points for the Playoffs
This is the latest point in the season that the Blackhawks have been in genuine playoff contention since the start of the rebuild. They’re still not out of it, yet, either. After inching out a point against the Minnesota Wild on Tuesday, one of the top contenders in the Central, the Blackhawks sit six points out of a wild card spot, with 51. In previous seasons, they finished the season around that point mark. If they can string some wins together, they might be able to take back that second wild card spot, the position they held up to Thanksgiving before all of the injuries.Â
With how tight everything is, though, that’s a pretty tall order. Chicago will need a miracle to make the playoffs, and they’re still looking to see what they can do with their pending unrestricted free agents at the March 6 trade deadline. For reference, with how positive this season has been overall, they’re still the sixth-worst team in the NHL.
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Even if the Blackhawks don’t make the playoffs, the possibility that they can make a slight playoff push before the possible roster teardown is exciting. Plus, it’s great for the young guns to experience meaningful hockey sooner rather than later; Connor Bedard will be of legal drinking age next season at 21. He isn’t getting any younger.
Despite the 5-1 loss to the Panthers at the end of the three-game gauntlet, the Blackhawks still held in there for the first two periods. Unfortunately, the wheels fell off the bus in the third period, and a 1-1 game turned into a four-goal period for Florida. Getting those three points was huge, and that should be the standard for the remaining 29 games on the schedule.
