Saturday’s Three Stars: 100 Minute Drought Ends, But Hawks Still Fall

Jim Neveau, PIB Co-conspirator

It only took over 115 minutes of game time, but the Chicago Blackhawks finally managed to light the lamp in the City of Angels.

Jonathan Toews scored a goal shortly into a third period power play, but it wasn’t enough in the end as the Blackhawks lost in a shootout to the Los Angeles Kings 2-1.

Once again, the Hawks came out of the gate completely flat, getting some shots on net but skating like they had reverse-Flubber in their skates. Likely a result of the lengthy road trip the team has been on, that plane headed back to Chicago will certainly be full of guys irritated by the loss, but still looking forward to sleeping in their own beds tonight.

The Kings out-muscled the Hawks throughout the game, delivering hellacious hits and playing absolutely suffocating defense. Some of the speedier Hawks like Marian Hossa and Patrick Kane found themselves hand-cuffed through the first two periods of the contest, and it looked for a long time that Chicago wasn’t going to be able to find the net on anything.

Fortunately for the Blackhawks, they were still able to apply pressure to Los Angeles goalie Jonathan Quick. They got 12 shots on net in the final period, and one of them finally tickled nylon when Toews put a rebound past Quick six and a half minutes in.

Overall, the Blackhawks outshot the Kings 33-22, but Quick was all over the crease, stopping shot after shot and causing havoc with anyone who dared skate too close to him. He had a couple of nifty poke-checks during the game, and that certainly caused Marian Hossa and Kane to rush shots on breaks, which didn’t exactly help matters offensively.

To make things worse, Joel Quenneville waited until the third period to start shaking up line combinations, something he normally does if the team goes longer than a couple of minutes without scoring. His clinging to the line combos that started the game bordered on ridiculous, especially compared with his track record. For the second night in a row, Quenneville was denied his 500th coaching victory, and if he had moved some guys around earlier in the contest, he may have indeed gotten it.

As it was, the line shake-up did seem to produce some better rushes, and even if the effect was simply psychological (much like changing a line-up in baseball), it worked, and it was interesting to see Kane on the ice once again with Sharp and Versteeg. Ladd, Hossa, and Toews also teamed up on the line after the beginning of the third period.

All in all, the Circus Trip should definitely be considered a success. With the nine points that they picked up on the road, the Hawks should have plenty of incentive to protect home ice on Tuesday night when they face the Blue Jackets.

There willbe a more detailed Circus Trip piece up tomorrow, but for now, here are tonight’s Three Stars:

Third Star: Duncan Keith/Jonathan Toews

It’s certainly up for debate which of these two men contributed in a bigger way to the final outcome of the game, so a tie seems completely logical.

Keith ran his ice time up to nearly 57 minutes over the past two games, which is a hell of a testament to his grit and determination. Anybody who can average that much ice time in the last two stops of a really long road trip deserves recognition as a credit to his team.

Toews may not have had the best night, but he did manage to get to the front of the net to score the Hawks’ goal in the third period. That ended the extremely long scoring drought the team had, and therefore he wins a Star by default.

Second Star: Cristobal Huet

A lot of people are going to be extremely upset with this pick, just because of his piss-poor shootout performance this evening (can we just pull a Julie for Goldberg switch and put Niemi in from now on during shootouts? Just wondering), but Huet single-handedly kept the team in the game during some huge rushes by the Kings. He made some spectacular saves, including one that had me tweeting with joy.

On a shot by a Kings player in the third period, Huet knelt down next to the net, and when another Kings player tried to deflect a shot in off of Huet’s pads, he was unsuccessful, because Huet angled his pad back toward the corner, where he could control a rebound and not risk it going into the net. It was a beautiful play, and showed that perhaps Huet is learning from his mistakes.

First Star: Patrick Kane

Kaner was one of the few Blackhawks who was on his game tonight. He had an assist in the contest, and he showed no ill effects from the road trip as he shot up and down the ice like he had been fired from a cannon.

The most noticeable asset that Kane brought to the ice on Saturday night was on display in the third period. He had been bogged down by a stifling Kings defensive attack in the first two periods, but his newly-attained endurance was shown in a third period that he simply dominated. Kane is quickly becoming an elite player for a reason, and games like tonight are just further examples of his evolution.

The Blackhawks will next skate on United Center ice on Tuesday night against the Columbus Blue Jackets at 7pm on Versus (sorry DirecTV users).

Tags: Andrew Ladd, Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, Cristobal Huet, Duncan Keith, Joel Quenneville, Jonathan Quick, Jonathan Toews, kris versteeg, Los Angeles Kings, marian hossa, Patrick Kane, Patrick Sharp