Down 2-0, Hawks remain confident
DETROIT - The Blackhawks are down but not out.
That's what the Hawks were saying Tuesday night following their heartbreaking 3-2 loss in overtime to the Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena.
Detroit leads the best-of-seven Western Conference final series 2-0 with Games 3 and 4 set for the United Center on Friday night and Sunday afternoon.
"You're supposed to win at home; that's the way I'm going to look at it," Brian Campbell said. "We go back home now and we have to take care of our business. We'll be fine. There's no letup in this team. There's still a lot of confidence in this hockey club."
After playing an excellent third period to pull even on Jonathan Toews' second goal of the night with 7:40 to play, the Hawks believed they were going to pull out the victory in overtime.
But Mikael Samuelsson picked off a pass by Campbell at his own blue line, starting a 3-on-1 he finished for the winning goal at 5:14.
"It's easy to get down on yourself and look at things in a negative light, but we're going to stick together and still keep that upbeat, excited attitude," Toews said. "We're gong to go back to work (today) and not let this one sink in too much and disappoint us and depress us.
"It's frustrating we couldn't come up with a win tonight. It would have been great going home with a split."
The Hawks would rather look at it like they need to win the next two games instead of the bigger picture that sees then having to beat the Red Wings four times in five games to take the series.
"We've got our work cut out for us now, but there's no pressure," Toews said. "We've just got to go out and battle and play loose and keep improving and picking our game up a notch every single game because it's only going to get tougher."
One thing the Hawks have going for them is they are 5-1 in the playoffs at the United Center.
"That's something we can get a little energy from, knowing we're going back to a building where we've been pretty good," Adam Burish said. "It's more than possible to even this thing back up at home."
Hawks coach Joel Quenneville made a line switch that worked well in Game 2, moving Dustin Byfuglien to the top line with Toews and putting Patrick Kane with Sammy Pahlsson.
Kane did have 3 shots on goal after getting none in Game 1, but and Pahlsson each were minus 2. They were on the ice for the OT goal, but the forwards weren't at fault.
"I thought Joel did a good job with his lines tonight," Red Wings coach Mike Babcock said. "Kane looked like he was having way too much fun out there. I thought we should have run him over a few times."
It's probably unfortunate for the Hawks that there are two days off until Game 3 on Friday.
"We really need the day off," Babcock said.
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