The Blackhawks can only hope Monday night’s game plays out more like the last time they met the Florida Panthers than the one they had Saturday night against Tampa Bay.
At no point during the preseason, when they were still adjusting to how the games were going to be officiated, were the Hawks ever short-handed as many times in one game as they were against the Lightning.
Twice during the preseason, against Nashville and Dallas, the Hawks were short-handed 10 times. But Saturday the Hawks were short-handed 13 times in their 3-2 overtime victory.
Most teams wouldn’t be happy giving up two power-play goals, but the Hawks were ecstatic with their penalty-killing effort.
“We gave up two goals, but it seemed as if our penalty killing won the game,” Hawks goalie Jocelyn Thibault said.
The Hawks are still third in the league in penalty killing, but their percentage went down slightly to 87.6 percent.
Many times a goalie has to be the best penalty killer, and that was certainly the case with Thibault. The Hawks weren’t short-handed at the time, but his lunging glove save against Vaclav Prospal with two minutes left in regulation saved the game for the Hawks.
“They were incredible; that starts with Joc,” Hawks coach Brian Sutter said of his penalty killers. “It goes right through to the defense.”
Tampa Bay had 21 minutes 48 minutes with at least one extra attacker, and on a couple of occasions two. By comparison, the Hawks had three power plays and spent a total of 3:18 with an extra skater.
“There was no flow to the hockey game at all,” Sutter said.
Paul Stewart, a veteran referee, and Ian Walsh called the game. Stewart seemed to make the majority of the calls. The Hawks believed Stewart missed a trip when Dave Andreychuk took the feet out from Lyle Odelein, leading to a turnover and the tying goal.
“We got beat up pretty good in front of their net, but that’s the way it goes,” Sutter said. “If the league doesn’t look at something like that, there’s something wrong.”
When the Panthers visited the United Center on Oct. 17, the Hawks had six power plays in the first period and 12 for the game, and they spent 21:08 with a man advantage. The Hawks scored just once on the power play but still posted a comfortable 4-1 victory.
Quicker on draw
The Hawks have moved up to 20th in the league in faceoff percentage at 48.99 percent. A lot of the credit can go to newly acquired Andrei Nikolishin. But in the last two games, Nikolishin is under 50 percent on faceoffs, winning 15 and losing 22.
Total team effort
Normally when there is a lot of special-teams play in a game, ice times get out of whack. But Sutter needed to use nearly his entire roster to kill penalties Saturday. Everyone except Chris Simon and Steve Thomas saw short-handed work.
As a result, everyone but Garry Valk played at least 10 minutes, and Valk was just 10 seconds short of it. The fourth line also saw more time than normal and scored the first goal when Nathan Dempsey fed Igor Korolev.
“They came out and were good early,” Sutter said.
Panthers update
Florida goalie Roberto Luongo has a bad back and is questionable Monday. His backup, Jani Hurme, posted the team’s first shutout Saturday with a 3-0 victory over Calgary. In three starts this season, Hurme is 2-0-1 with a 1.28 goals-against averageand a .962 save percentage.
