Penguins top Blackhawks in overtime
What will Blackhawks general manager Dale Tallon do before Wednesday's trade deadline?
From the reaction of many in the crowd of 22,689 who watched the Hawks kick away a game to the Pittsburgh Penguins at the United Center on Friday night, they might have a few suggestions.
Keeping Nikolai Khabibulin likely would be one of them after a second straight sloppy performance by Cristobal Huet, who was pulled following the second period of the 5-4 overtime loss to the Penguins.
Finding a lockdown defensive defenseman somewhere might be another need becoming more pressing.
Jonathan Toews' first career hat trick wasn't enough to prevent the Hawks from losing their third straight game.
The Penguins won it on Evgeni Malkin's power-play goal 1:36 into OT. The Hawks never led after falling behind 2-0 early.
"I didn't mind most of the things we did," Hawks coach Joel Quenneville said. "It's tough to play catch-up in our league, and we were fortunate to get a point.
"We need points, and we can't be satisfied with the results. We're talking about how we played and we should be talking about wins and losses. We've got to respond with winning hockey. We did some good things, but playing catch up usually winds up with a poor result."
Huet allowed 4 goals on 22 shots before leaving trailing 4-2. It appeared early Huet would be in for a tough night when he gave up a soft rebound goal to Jordan Staal just 3:36 into the first period.
Huet let 2 other softies tricked through his pads, although Maxime Talbot's goal at 19:01 of the second period that made it 4-2 deflected off Cam Barker's skate in front.
"By no means was it Huey's fault," Toews said. "We need to help him out a little more."
Rookie Antti Niemi took over to start the third period and became the first goalie other than Huet or Khabibulin to play in a game for the Hawks. Niemi has been with the team since Khabibulin got hurt Feb. 11 in Atlanta, but Friday's start was Huet's eighth straight.
Quenneville said he pulled Huet because of his performance and because he felt it was a good opportunity to finally get Niemi some work.
"You're down 2 in your own building and he hasn't played yet and we want to get him in a game," Quenneville said.
Niemi stopped all 4 shots he faced in the third period but had little chance on Malkin's overtime rocket from inside the right circle.
The Penguins got the power play as a result of Kris Versteeg's late tripping penalty.
The Hawks fell behind 2-0 in the first nine minutes before Toews scored the first of his 3 power-play goals at 15:44 of the first period. Toews tied it at 6:37 of the second period then brought the Hawks within 4-3 with his third goal and team-leading 25th of the season at 1:55 of the third.
Dave Bolland's goal with 4:45 to play sent the game to overtime.
"We had a great third period, but we could have had a better first," Brent Seabrook said.
<div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Stories</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="/story/?id=275746">Helmets off to Toews for hat trick <span class="date"> [2/27/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=275708">Hawks could be active as trade deadline nears <span class="date"> [2/27/09]</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>