You might think a hockey team would generally perform better the more rest it has, and when it has no rest, it might not be at its peak.
But the opposite has been true this season for the Blackhawks, who have been better with no rest than with a lot of rest. On Saturday, the Hawks played their fifth game of the season with three or more days of rest and are 1-4-0 in those games.
By contrast, the Hawks are 8-2-1 in the second game of a back-to-back after Sunday’s 5-1 victory against the Sabres.
Overall, it was a statistic that flummoxed defenseman Brent Seabrook.
"I never thought of that," he said. "I don’t know if there’s any rhyme or reason to that. We just have to keep doing what we’re doing."
But coach Joel Quenneville said the statistic was not a surprise to him. It’s a continuation of the Hawks’ success on the tail end of back-to-back games since his tenure began.
"We’ve always been pretty effective in that second game and I think the balance and the depth of our team gives us a chance every single night," Quenneville said. "Our goaltending is consistent and the balance of our game is fine."
The Hawks weren’t exactly rusty in their game Saturday coming off six days of rest in a 3-1 loss to the Oilers, and rest hasn’t always been a bad thing for them — they were a combined 27-11-4 when getting one or two days of rest. The Hawks have only one more break of three or more days in the schedule coming between games on March 4 and 9.
Hinostroza back: Vinnie Hinostroza’s stay in Rockford came to an end when that Hawks called up the rookie forward ahead of Sunday’s game.
Hinostroza had one assist in three games with the IceHogs. He has six goals and eight assists in 15 games with the Hawks this season.
Of the four players the Hawks sent to Rockford before their extended break — Hinostroza, Tanner Kero, Gustav Forsling and Nick Schmaltz — only Forsling remains.
Q not concerned with expansion: Quenneville said he had given some thought to the upcoming expansion draft in June for the new Las Vegas franchise but said it wasn’t on his "front" burner. The Hawks, along with every NHL team, will lose one player and one player only in the draft.
"We’ve had a couple discussions about it, but I think it’s a little bit further on the radar," Quenneville said. "Organizationally, that’s something that’s looked at a lot, whether it’s the money side of it, the business side of it or the personnel side."
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