Healthy Toews leads Blackhawks past Kings
All appeared right again with the Blackhawks on Monday night.
Jonathan Toews was back in the lineup and scored a goal, the power play connected twice and Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook led a team effort to shut down the potent Los Angeles Kings offense.
It added up to a 4-1 victory at the United Center that snapped a two-game losing streak and had the Hawks looking more like their high-flying selves.
"We check the standings," Hawks center John Madden said. "We were in ninth place and we've got to move up. We've allowed ourselves to slip. We weren't playing the same way we were before and we've got to get back to that."
The Hawks went 2-for-3 on the power play with Toews scoring one of the goals in the third period.
"It was good to get our captain back in the lineup," said Madden, who opened the scoring in the first period. "He brings a presence regardless if he scored tonight or not. He competes so hard and you can feed off that and it becomes contagious out there."
Toews, who missed six games and nearly three weeks with a concussion, played 19 minutes and won 13 of 20 faceoffs in addition to scoring his second goal of the season.
Ben Eager also turned in a solid eight minutes in his return from more than a month off because of a concussion.
"We got a lot of energy off both of them," Hawks coach Joel Quenneville said.
"I felt great," Toews said. "I wasn't thinking about my symptoms or anything coming back at all. I took the necessary rest and feel healthy, but most of all I felt great on the ice."
Troy Brouwer played a major role in the win with a goal, 2 assists and 6 hits.
It was Brouwer's power-play goal at 1:33 of the third period, a tip-in of a Patrick Sharp shot, which snapped a 1-1 tie.
"Right from warm up, I felt I had a lot of good jump in my game and got in the game early with a couple big hits," Brouwer said.
"Nice game," Quenneville said of Brouwer's effort. "Production-wise, I thought he was good, but I thought he was forceful with his size and his quickness. All the way around, I don't want to say it was his best (game), but we'll take that game in and game out."
Kings center Anze Kopitar, the NHL's leading scorer, got his 14th goal but was otherwise quiet with 2 shots on goal.
Keith and Seabrook were on the ice against the Kopitar-Ryan Smyth line with centers Madden and Toews both getting shifts against them.
"We definitely were tight on some of their best players," Toews said. "We were smart and kind of boxed them in a little bit and just tried to tire them out."
The win kicked off what is a critical four-game homestand for the Hawks.
"We've got some pretty tough teams coming in here and our first goal obviously was to beat L.A. coming in here tonight," Brouwer said. "Another goal was to get our power play going and we did."
<p class="factboxheadblack">Tim Sassone's game tracker</p> <p class="News">Blackhawks 4, Kings 1</p> <p class="News"><b>Three stars</b></p> <p class="News">1. Troy Brouwer, Hawks: A power-play goal, 2 assists and 6 hits for the big winger.</p> <p class="News">2. Jonathan Toews, Hawks: Scored a power-play goal and won 13 of 20 faceoffs in 19 minutes in his return from a concussion.</p> <p class="News">3. Duncan Keith, Hawks: Two assists and a good defensive job against the Anze Kopitar line.</p> <p class="News"><b>Key stat</b></p> <p class="News">The Hawks scored more than 3 goals for the first time since Oct. 14 - nine games ago. They are 5-0 when scoring 4 or more goals.</p> <p class="News"><b>About time</b></p> <p class="News">Not since the second game of the season against Florida in Finland had the Hawks scored more than 1 power-play goal. They were 2-for-3 on Monday.</p> <div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Stories</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="/story/?id=335321">Byfuglien adjusting to new role <span class="date"> [11/09/09]</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>