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Mediocre foes bring out the worst in the Hawks

The Blackhawks continue to struggle against teams that aren't in playoff contention.

Their latest such loss on Friday night at the United Center - a 5-2 defeat against the Columbus Blue Jackets - was further proof. It also narrowed the gap to just a point between the Hawks and Minnesota Wild for third place in the Central Division.

The Wild, with one more game played, beat the Calgary Flames on Friday night. They're now breathing down the neck of the Hawks, who have eight games left in the regular season.

"We're not going to overreact and get down on ourselves," said captain Jonathan Toews, who scored 1 of the Hawks' 2 goals in the first period. "We'll try to pick the good moments we had out of our game out there and build off that, and try to find a way to get some energy and get ready for Sunday."

That game is in Winnipeg against a Jets team that's vying for a postseason spot and has given the Hawks fits already this season. It will be followed Monday with the second game in a back-to-back set at home against the Los Angeles Kings, the defending NHL champs who are also clinging to a wild-card spot.

"We've got one game against a team that's hard to play against (Sunday)," Hawks coach Joel Quenneville said. "We've got to go into their building and I'm looking at one game. I'm not looking at anything further than that and trying to get momentum winning a period, winning a shift and looking at the small picture."

The recent picture is an ugly sight. The Hawks have lost three of the past four games and each opponent was already out of the postseason picture. That includes the Blue Jackets, despite their five-game winning streak and seven-game winning streak in road games.

Columbus might be hot, but this was another winnable game that got away from the Blackhawks, who were 0-for-5 on the power play. If they don't catch the St. Louis Blues or Nashville Predators for home-ice advantage in the playoffs, or if the Wild passes them for third, the Hawks will have a lingering bad habit to thank.

Friday it was due to defensive errors in a 4-goal first for the Blue Jackets, who were led by Cam Atkinson's hat trick. He scored 2 of those goals in the first to forge a 4-2 lead for Columbus and chase Corey Crawford from the net. Crawford allowed all 4 goals in the first on 13 shots and has allowed 4 goals in three of his past four starts, all losses.

Quenneville only placed the blame on Crawford for 1 of the goals, which made it 3-2 at 13:03 of the first on a long point shot by defenseman Kevin Connauton. Otherwise, it was sloppiness with the puck that was most at fault.

"The quality was on what we gave them," Quenneville said. "It was too high of quality. I didn't pull him because of what he let in. It was just we wanted to change things up."

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