Lightning doesn't strike twice: Bedard quiet in Hawks' loss to Tampa Bay

Coach Jon Cooper knows a special hockey player when he sees one.

Quite a few have helped lead Tampa Bay to four Stanley Cup Final appearances in the last nine seasons.

So when asked about Connor Bedard before the Lightning's 4-2 victory over the Blackhawks at the United Center on Thursday, it was no surprise to hear Cooper say: "I love watching guys like that. There's some special players in the league, and he's got some special gifts."

Cooper saw them first hand when Bedard scored 2 goals and notched 2 assists during the Hawks' 5-3 win in Tampa Bay last week.

Still, that doesn't mean Cooper is about to call Bedard the second coming of Wayne Gretzky, Sidney Crosby or Nikita Kucherov.

After all, the kid's played 14 games. Let's not lose our collective minds.

"He kind of has that vision Kuch has," Cooper said. "(But) again, short sample size. He's so young.

"You don't want to anoint guys. I'm not a big believer in that, but he has the traits - and you can see (that) in his vision.

"Some of the plays he made, it's impressive at such a young age."

Bedard exposed the Lightning last week in every way imaginable: With his lethal shot, precise passing and explosive speed into and through the offensive zone.

It was a different story Thursday, however, as Bedard found very little room to operate and managed only 1 shot on goal.

"It felt like last game we gave him a lot of looks, and you give players like that open ice they're going to burn you," said Tampa Bay defenseman Victor Hedman, who snapped a 2-2 tie by scoring his fourth goal of the season with 8:07 remaining.

"Today we had to make sure that he had to work for his chances, and we did a better job of not giving him too much."

The Hawks took a 1-0 lead when Lukas Reichel scored on the power play at 12:59 of the first period. Reichel - in the bumper position for the first time in his career - redirected a shot from Philipp Kurashev for his first goal of the season.

"I didn't even know that I scored," Reichel said. "I thought (Corey) Perry had a stick on it, so I didn't even know.

"But then I was like, 'Yeah, (freaking) right.'"

Luke Richardson was also happy to see the goal, but the Hawks' coach still wants the skilled forward to shoot more.

"He had a chance in the second period, he passed it off," Richardson said.

"He just has to get that out of himself, take charge and shoot those. Good things will happen."

Tampa Bay went ahead 2-1 in the second period, but the Hawks knotted things up when Perry tapped in a pass from Jason Dickinson at 2:09 of the third period.

Hedman scored after Erik Cernak shot the puck off the glass behind the goal.

The puck bounced right to Hedman, who easily put the puck past Hawks goalie Petr Mrazek.

The Hawks, who took a season-low 15 shots on goal, fell to 5-9-0. Tampa Bay improved to 7-6-4.

"(In the third period), they had the puck way too much in our zone," Richardson said.

"We just couldn't get it back. ... We kind of threw a puck away out of a pile instead of holding it there for a while.

"You know what? They're a good team," Richardson said. "They played us really well the last half of the game and unfortunately we didn't have enough time with the puck."

Roster update:

The Hawks recalled Filip Roos from Rockford on Thursday and placed on Nikita Zaitsev on nonroster for personal reasons. Coach Luke Richardson said Zaitsev will probably not travel to Nashville for Saturday's game, but "hopefully (will) be back with the team shortly."

Taylor Hall (lower body) did not play Thursday but did skate hard during an optional morning skate. It's possible he returns to face the Predators.