By scheduling two games here in a span of three days for the Blackhawks and St. Louis Blues, the NHL was hoping to give the contests a playoff feeling.
Judging from the thousands of empty seats, the locals weren’t buying the premise. Mimicking the postseason in the first week of January might be as close as either team gets.
But staring at their third straight loss, the Hawks scored three goals Tuesday night in a span of 3 minutes 23 seconds of the third period on their way to a 4-1 victory.
Goals by Martin Havlat, Peter Bondra and Jeff Hamilton pulled the Hawks back to the .500 mark. The Hawks, who got a late goal from Martin Lapointe, will try to sweep the two-game series Thursday night.
The loss was the first in regulation in eight games for the Blues, also enjoying a bit of a renaissance with new coach Andy Murray.
Havlat’s goal likely eased a few concerns for the Hawks. Not only had he gone five games without one, he had gone nearly five periods without a shot on goal.
Havlat had a shot in the first two minutes of Sunday’s loss at Columbus, then went the rest of the game and the first 46 minutes Tuesday night without getting a shot until he took a feed from Radim Vrbata and slid a backhander past Manny Legace to tie the game 1-1 at 6:15 of the third period.
The Hawks did their best to put themselves in a big hole early, giving the Blues five power plays in the first 10:36.
But the Blues weren’t having any of it and waited until their third two-man advantage of the period before cashing in, with Keith Tkachuk whipping a shot past Nikolai Khabibulin for his 11th goal of the season.
By that point, the Hawks were being outshot 13-1 yet still had a chance because of the play of Khabibulin. He went from post to post to snuff out a Martin Rucinsky one-timer early in the first and turned aside another Tkachuk shot late in the second.
Khabibulin caught a bit of a break with 4:15 remaining when Jay McClement appeared to have him beat but hit the post. Khabibulin then stopped Jamal Mayers’ rebound attempt while on the seat of his pants.
Considering the kind of shots they were putting on Legace in the first two periods, the Hawks could have done worse than having Khabibulin skate a couple of shifts as a forward.
Three power plays came and went in the first two periods, along with 13 shots with which Legace had few problems.
One-timers
Bondra’s goal was his first since scoring his 500th Dec. 22 against Toronto. . . . Hamilton’s goal was his first in four games. . . . Defenseman Lasse Kukkonen had a different sort of hat trick Tuesday. Kukkonen took three minor penalties. . . . Rene Bourque, who is scoreless in eight games since returning from a throat injury, was scratched along with Carl Corazzini. . . . Tony Salmelainen played 2:38 in the first period Tuesday, which is more than he played in three of his last five games. . . . This week’s issue of Sports Illustrated profiles coach Denis Savard.
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rfoltman@tribune.com
