Hossa, Kane do it again for Blackhawks
The Blackhawks' best players continue to be their best players.
Marian Hossa's power-play goal in overtime Thursday night gave the Hawks a 3-2 come-from-behind win over the Dallas Stars for their fourth straight victory to start the season.
It was Hossa's fifth goal in four games and was set up by Patrick Kane, who has four straight multi-point games. The Hawks haven't won their first four games since 1972-73.
All 3 goals by Hawks came on the power play, which was 3-for-7. Patrick Sharp and Jonathan Toews also scored, while Duncan Keith saved a goal with a nice play with time running out in the second period.
The Hawks spoiled the night for Stars goalie Kari Lehtonen, who stopped 38 of 40 shots in regulation.
“He was having a great game,” said Hossa, who was frustrated at least three times by Lehtonen. “I had so many chances, I passed by him and told him hopefully I will get one, and I did at the end.”
Hossa buried Kane's behind-the-back pass.
“As soon as he didn't take a shot, I tried to get open because he sees the ice so well behind him,” Hossa said. “I tried to get ready for a one-timer.
“Tonight was a great experience. We've been winning games with the lead, but tonight we were behind. It's only four games, but we like where we are.”
The pass from the left side to the right surprised the Stars and Hawks coach Joel Quenneville.
“What a play; you can probably talk about that one for a long time,” Quenneville told reporters. “It's like he had eyes behind his head. He saw Hoss when everybody thought it was on the left side, including me, and he pulls it off. And Hoss doesn't waste it, he buries it. It was a special ending.”
The Hawks weren't very good on the power play in the first period and allowed a crushing short-handed goal with 1.4 seconds left in the period when Loui Eriksson got one through Corey Crawford.
Eriksson's shot found its way through Crawford and tricked over the goal line as time wound down.
Lehtonen was at his best in the second period before a goal by Ray Whitney following a turnover by Michal Rozsival made it 2-0.
Lehtonen stopped Marcus Kruger, Brandon Saad and Hossa, all in tight. Later he made a save on Hossa came on a 3-on-1 then stopped Toews.
Crawford kept the Hawks in it with a save on Ryan Garbutt on a penalty shot early in the period after a Brent Seabrook trip.
The Hawks finally got on the scoreboard at 15:57 on a power play when a centering pass by Sharp intended for Viktor Stalberg eluded Lehtonen off the stick of Stars defenseman Trevor Daley.
The Stars nearly had a last-second goal for the second period in a row. A point shot by Alex Goligoski trickled through Crawford again and sat in the crease, but Keith swept it away with seven-tenths of a second on the clock.
“I was just standing there and it was going in,” Keith said. “I was lucky to get my stick on it.”
Quenneville adjusted his lineup slightly by inserting Jamal Mayers and sitting Brandon Bollig. It was Mayers' first appearance of the season.
Everything else stayed the same, including on defense, where the second pair of Niklas Hjalmarsson and Johnny Oduya and the third pairing of Nick Leddy and Rozsival have eased the workload of Keith and Seabrook.
“We want to make sure with our schedule being so tight, especially this week, that we use everybody and everybody can share some ice time,” Quenneville said.
tsassone@dailyherald.com