The Chicago Blackhawks blew a 3-1 lead in the third period, but Seth Jones scored in overtime to give them a 4-3 win over the New York Islanders on Friday night at the United Center.
Despite a strong start for the Blackhawks, when they had the first seven shots quickly, the Islanders scored on their first shot of the game at the 6:09 mark of the first. Hudson Fasching sent a quick pass in the zone to a streaking Brock Nelson, who beat Petr Mrazek far side.
The second period was quite a snoozefest until Boris Katchouk tied the game 1-1 with 1:53 left in the period. He was initially stopped on a breakaway but then came back around to score from the high slot through traffic.
And that goal was quickly followed by one from Joey Anderson to put the Blackhawks up 2-1 with 45.7 seconds left in the second. Anderson finished after a pass from Colin Blackwell on a 2-on-1 rush.
The Blackhawks extended their lead 5:10 into the third period off a snap shot from Jason Dickinson, who scored after a little give-and-go with Anderson, making it 3-1 Blackhawks.
A little over a minute later, the Islanders made it a one-goal game again. Matthew Barzal made a beautiful cross-ice pass to Bo Horvat, whose wrister just made it past Mrazek.
Then, what felt like a very inevitable goal was scored by the Islanders to tie the game 3-3 with 7:10 left in the third period. Kyle Palmieri skated the puck in on Mrazek but couldn’t get an initial shot off, so he went for a wrap-around on the other side of the net.
Luckily for the Blackhawks, Seth Jones scored just 22 seconds into overtime. Jones skated into the zone, looked around at his options, and used an Islanders defensemen as a screen to score, giving the Blackhawks a 4-3 victory.
Notes
- The Blackhawks started the game really well, owning 57.89 percent of the shot attempts and 64.55 percent of the expected goals at 5-on-5, so of course they came out of that period down a goal. And then in the second, it was basically the opposite with them at 36.96 and 32.3 percent in those same respective stats, yet the Blackhawks ended up with a 2-1 lead. Because hockey!
- The third was more exciting, but just as lopsided in favor of the Islanders: the Blackhawks were out-attempted 23-10, outshot 12-2, outchanced 13-4, and outscored 2-1 in the final 20 minutes. The good news is that the Blackhawks managed to still get the win despite squandering two leads, thanks mostly to some solid play from Mrazek to keep the score close and then Jones’ heroics in overtime.
- Speaking of Mrazek, his save-percentage doesn’t look pretty — just .897 — but he really did have to put in work, especially in the third, for this game to go well for the Blackhawks.
- Before the final two minutes of the second period, this was honestly feeling like a repeat of the Buffalo game: lackluster and sleepy, despite the occasional scrappiness between the players.
- This was the first time (out of eight opportunities) this season the Blackhawks have won the second game of a back-to-back.
- I’m not a fan of ragging on the refereeing in games, but it really sucked tonight, didn’t it? The first period was especially egregious. For example, Blackwell was cross-checked before he tussled with Matthew Barzal, but he ended up with the double-minor for roughing while Barzal just got two minutes. I guess because he took his gloves off? Suspect. Don’t get me started on the Zach Stanford slashing penalty, because that was laughably bad.
- Poor Isaak Phillips. It’s somewhat impossible to know his true potential because he’s often skating with the slugs of the Blackhawks defense. Tinordi was a journeyman No. 7 at best for seven years before joing the Blackhawks organization for a reason.
- Seth Jones picked up his 100th point as a Blackhawk tonight with his secondary assist on Dickinson’s goal. Sometimes secondary assists can be superfluous, but it was Jones’ hard work in his own zone and his pass up to Anderson that started the play for the goal. Topping a good game off with the overtime winner — Jones’ first goal of the season — was pretty nice too. The shot was so benign, even Jones was surprised it went in. It almost looked like Sorkin deflected the puck in with his own paddle.
- Before the game, it was reported that Nick Foligno (broken finger) was expected to start practicing with the team again Saturday and planned to travel on the upcoming road trip. Whether he’ll skate in any of those games is still unknown.
- The Blackhawks have one of the easier strengths of schedule in the back half of the season, but it doesn’t really start until after the upcoming road trip.
Game Charts
Three Stars
- Seth Jones (CHI) — 1 goal, 1 assist
- Jason Dickinson (CHI) — 1 goal, 2 assists
- Joey Anderson (CHI) — 1 goal, 2 assists
What’s Next
The Blackhawks have the weekend off before heading to Vancouver to face the Canucks on Monday for a 9 p.m. start.