The Blackhawks picked the wrong team to fall behind against Monday night, and that, along with a disallowed goal, brought their winning streak to an end at three games.
The St. Louis Blues, who have struggled at home all season but are money in the bank when they lead after two periods, beat the Hawks 4-2 before 19,648 at the Kiel Center. The loss was the Hawks’ first at Kiel in seven games. St. Louis improved to 19-1-2 when leading after two periods and 10-6-2 under coach Joel Quenneville.
St. Louis (28-26-6) took a 2-0 lead in the first 9:39. Harry York skated alone into the slot, took a nice feed from Scott Pellerin and beat Jeff Hackett to make it 1-0. Then midway through the period, the puck eluding Hawks defenseman Michal Sykora led to disaster. Hackett came way out of the net to clear the puck, but Pellerin intercepted it inside the blue line and knocked home his seventh goal of the season.
The Hawks (23-28-8) got one goal back at 12:17 on Eric Daze’s 13th of the season. Gary Suter’s shot on the power play deflected over the net, where Chris Chelios chased it down and centered to Daze, who did the rest. Suter’s assist on the play marked his 700th career point.
The Hawks tied it at 17:52, or at least they thought they had. Bob Probert beat Grant Fuhr, but the goal was waved off because Jim Cummins was in the crease.
The Hawks tied it for real with 23.5 seconds left in the period, Ulf Dahlen finishing off a nice 2 on 1 with Tony Amonte.
St. Louis regained the lead during a 5-on-3 power play at 8:08 of the second period. Hackett kicked aside Brett Hull’s slap shot, but Pierre Turgeon was right in front to flip the rebound over Hackett’s left shoulder.
Two brilliant saves by Fuhr with about 4 minutes left in the game stuffed the Hawks’ last hopes. Craig Conroy’s empty-netter for St. Louis ended the scoring.
