Before their extended break, the Blackhawks had won five consecutive games and were playing some of their best hockey of the season.
So one of the main questions headed into Saturday’s game against the Oilers was if the Hawks would resume their quality play or if the six-day break would act as a hard reset and bring them back down.
The answer was more of the former than the latter, but the only problem was that Oilers goaltender Cam Talbot was just a touch better.
The Oilers defeated the Hawks 3-1 at the United Center to snap that five-game win streak despite the Hawks controlling the puck most of the night.
The Hawks ended up with 39 shots on goal while the Oilers had 22, but the Oilers just found the net a few times thanks to a goal from Matt Benning that went in off the skate of Trevor van Riemsdyk and a third-period score from Milan Lucic and an empty netter from Connor McDavid.
The Hawks came out in the first period like a team with fresh legs and dominated puck possession throughout. They ended with 12 shots on goal and kept the Oilers to just one shot on goal for the first 18:19 of the period. But the Hawks couldn’t capitalize on the sustained zone pressure or a pair of power plays they drew in the period and the score remained 0-0.
They came close a few times to scoring, once when Marian Hossa hit a post on the Hawks’ first power play, and Artemi Panarin hit the other post later in the period. Panarin appeared to score and momentarily sent the crowd into a frenzy and set the flashing lights off at the United Center before the crowd realized he hadn’t scored.
It was a slower start to the second period for the Hawks, who began the period on the kill and later had to kill off an instigating penalty on Ryan Hartman for instigating a fight he had with Oilers defenseman Eric Gryba, who had push Tanner Kero over into the board.
Hartman earned five minutes for fighting, two for instigating and a 10-minute misconduct penalty. Gryba, meanwhile, just received five for fighting.
While the fight pumped up the crowd for a moment, it ended as a negative for the Hawks.
On the ensuing power play, Matt Benning scored for the Oilers off the skate of Trevor van Riemsdyk for a 1-0 lead at 5:02 and the Hawks were without Hartman the rest of the period.
After the sluggish start, the Hawks generated a number of chances in the second half of the period, but again they could not come up with a goal on Oilers goaltender Cam Talbot.
After two periods, the Hawks held a 28-13 edge in shots on goal.
The Oilers extended their lead in the third when Milan Lucic sent the puck in the net between Crawford’s legs at 9:50 causing Crawford to raise his head to the rafters in frustration.
The Hawks kept applying the pressure they had applied all game and finally got on the board when Richard Panik scored in close on Talbot at 15:13, but that was the lone score on a night the Hawks thought there should have been more.
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