Here’s the kind of day it was Saturday for the Blackhawks: Their best player on the ice hadn’t played since April and didn’t have a contract until Friday.
The Hawks were routed 5-1 by the New Jersey Devils before 16,027 at Continental Airlines Arena, snapping a three-game winning streak.
“[New Jersey] played a heck of a game,” Hawks coach Brian Sutter said. “Give them credit for what they did. We weren’t good enough, plain and simple.”
About the only Hawk to have at least a decent game was Andrei Nikolishin. Acquired from Washington along with Chris Simon for Michael Nylander, Nikolishin was a restricted free agent who had yet to play this season.
He signed a two-year contract Friday shortly after being acquired by the Hawks and was in the lineup Saturday along with Simon.
Nikolishin played 14 minutes 9 seconds, won 12-of-21 faceoffs and led the team with five shots on goal.
“I almost died in the first period,” Nikolishin said.
Sutter said Nikolishin was “excellent; nothing wrong with the way he played at all.”
The same couldn’t be said for Simon, who was a minus-1 after 10 seconds, when Jamie Langenbrunner scored the first of his two goals, minus-2 after 3:32 and completed the trifecta late in the first when his giveaway in front of the net led to Langenbrunner’s second to make it 3-0 New Jersey after 20 minutes.
“I was a little nervous,” Simon said. “You try to tell yourself not to be nervous, just to go out and play your game.”
Falling behind by one goal against the Devils–the NHL’s best defensive team–is bad enough. But when it gets to three, it’s time to get ready for the next game.
“It’s over with, we have to go on,” Sutter said. “We have to learn from this.”
The Devils’ “checking” unit of John Madden, Langenbrunner and Jay Pandolfo buried the Hawks.
The unit–all three of whom were named stars of the game–combined for all three goals in the first period while matched up against the Hawks’ top unit of Alex Zhamnov, Sergei Berezin and Simon.
Langenbrunner banged a rebound past Steve Passmore as the Hawks botched an opening faceoff that they won. The goal came at the 10-second mark, one second off the team record for fastest goal by an opponent.
About the only thing the Hawks did well in the first period was to win faceoffs. They won 11 of 15, yet still found themselves down three goals and outshot 11-4. New Jersey quickly corrected the problem, finishing the game with a 32-26 faceoff edge while outshooting the Hawks 41-19.
After their defensive specialists dug the grave, the Devils’ skilled players threw dirt over it.
Leading 3-1 after Lyle Odelein’s goal in the second, Joe Nieuwendyk walked right between Phil Housley and Odelein on a breakaway in the opening minute of the third and missed. Pesky Brian Gionta beat every Hawk to the loose puck–another trend on the day–and seconds later Nieuwendyk had his second goal of the season.
Patrik Elias closed the scoring midway through the third.
