Blackhawks drop Game 1 to Predators
When the Stanley Cup playoffs opened Wednesday night, four out of five teams that earned home-ice advantage in the first round found themselves in a 1-0 series hole.
Minnesota, Edmonton, Ottawa and Montreal combined for a paltry 4 goals in those losses and face what most would consider must-win situations in Game 2.
Now you can go ahead and add the Blackhawks to that list, thanks to a pesky bunch of Predators who came into the United Center and escaped with a 1-0 victory Thursday. Nashville, which got spectacular goaltending out of Pekka Rinne and seemed to frustrate the Hawks at every turn, made a first-period goal by Viktor Arvidsson stand up and shocked the hockey universe by upending the top-seeded team in the Western Conference.
Game 2 is at the United Center on Saturday.
"We obviously gave up home ice, so Saturday's game becomes even more important," said Patrick Kane, who played a whopping 24:23 and took 6 shots on goal. "It's a huge game.
"Obviously we'll try and learn from this Game 1; not get too down on ourselves here. We know it's going to be a long series. They're a good team. Give them credit tonight.
"Game 2, I'm sure the building will be rocking. It will be fun."
It may well be, but Thursday's game was anything but fun for the Hawks as they watched Rinne turn away 29 shots on goal and the Predators block another 26 attempts.
"We did a really good job messing up their systems and didn't give them too much flow," Rinne said. "They like to play with a lot of speed and puck possession, and we did the right things on the ice. I think that's also a credit for us to interrupt their style of play."
Said Niklas Hjalmarsson: "I think they out-battled us a little bit today. That's why we couldn't get into those dangerous areas in front of their goalie."
That had better change in a hurry because if it doesn't, Nashville might just do what almost nobody thought was possible - and that's win this series.
"I mean, any goalie who sees the puck as much as he did tonight (is) going to be effective," Quenneville said. "We've got to find a way to get through and hang around. That's where the rewards are."
The Hawks got off to a decent start with 5 shots on goal in the first six minutes, but fell behind 7:52 into the first period when Arvidsson tipped in a Filip Forsberg shot after Forsberg took a pass from Ryan Johansen. Jonathan Toews, Richard Panik and Nick Schmaltz were all bunched together in front of Johansen as he made the pass, and it left Forsberg wide open. Schmaltz actually upended Panik and both laid helpless on the Predators blue line when Arvidsson scored.
"Kind of a mix-up there at the blue line and all of a sudden a guy finds himself all alone behind our defensemen," Toews said.
After sleepwalking through the rest of the first period, the Hawks controlled the flow of the game and had plenty of chances to knot the score. Kane had a pair of point-blank shots turned away by Rinne in the second period, and Marian Hossa also failed to convert on a shot in close after taking a perfect pass from Ryan Hartman.
Artem Anisimov, who missed the last 13 games of the regular season with a leg injury, also should have buried a couple of shots. His best opportunity came about four minutes into the third period when he pounced on a puck sitting right in front of the net, but the shot bounced off Rinne and into the corner.
"Timing a little bit off," Anisimov said. "The puck went through me (a lot). I need to bury those chances to score. Next game's going to be better."
If it is, we'll have a series that's knotted at one game a piece.
If it's not? Well, then feel free to sound the alarm.
"The intensity, the speed, the physicality - it steps up every single game," Toews said. "I won't say teams feel each other out in the first game, but there's no doubt it becomes more personal as the series goes along. So we'll expect that in the second game … and we need to respond and have the best 60 minutes we've had so far this year. It's a big one."
3 stars of the game
1. Pekka Rinne, Predators. Goalie earned shutout by making 29 saves, including 4 impressive ones in the second period.
2. Viktor Ardvisson, Predators. Scored the game's only goal after three Blackhawks collided just inside Nashville blue line.
3 Corey Crawford, Blackhawks. Played a solid game in net in a losing effort, making 19 saves.