The Chicago Blackhawks defeated the Carolina Hurricanes in a shootout on the back of birthday boy, Oliver Moore.
After a long, emotional stretch of games celebrating the past, the Chicago Blackhawks are now back to being focused solely on the future. On Thursday night, they hit the road for one game to take on the Carolina Hurricanes.
Carolina, known for playing a suffocating style defensively, is a hard team to play against, especially in their own building. The Blackhawks needed a big effort to even think about beating them.
Frank Nazar returned to the lineup for Chicago in this game. That means that Nazar, Connor Bedard, Nick Lardis, Oliver Moore, and Artyom Levshunov skated in the same lineup for the first time together. The future brightens for the organization every day. There are more great prospects on the way.
The Blackhawks weren't playing at their best early in this game, but that didn't stop them from going up 1-0. Ilya Mikheyev scored a short-handed goal to make it 1-0 at 11:12 of the first period.
The lead didn't last long, however, as Joel Nystrom scored his first career NHL goal to tie the game up at one.
In the second period, Oliver Moore and Ryan Donato made a nifty play to find Nick Lardis, who scored his 6th of the season to make it 2-1 Blackhawks.
Before long, at 9:16 of the middle frame, Jordan Staal tied the game back up. He created a two-on-one by taking advantage of a tough Artyom Levshunov pinch. That put Connor Bedard in a bad position, and Staal took full advantage.
Later in the period, Lardis took a big hit from Hurricanes defenseman Alex Nikishin. Oliver Moore, who was celebrating his 21st birthday on Thursday, came to the defense of his linemate.
Although the fight decisively went to Nikishin (three punches), it was a great move by Moore as he stood up for his fellow rookie. After connecting on a goal earlier in the period, you can expect more big moments for Moore and Lardis together.
The 2-2 tie held through the second intermission. In the final frame, the two teams exchanged goals once more.
Connor Murphy received a beautiful pass from Tyler Bertuzzi before putting on the moves to score his second goal of the season, less than a minute before Jackson Blake scored a tap-in goal on a neat pass by Logan Stankoven.
Nothing more came in regulation time or overtime, so the match went to a shootout. There, Connor Bedard and Andrei Svechnikov each scored in the second round, but that was all of the scoring until they got all the way to the sixth round.
In that sixth round, after Spencer Knight kept Mark Jankowski from scoring, Oliver Moore completed his big birthday game with the shootout winner.
This won't count as an official Gordie Howe Hat Trick for Moore on his birthday, but for all intents and purposes, he scored one. His team won in large part because of the way he played.
It must also be noted that the Blackhawks went 5/5 on the penalty kill in this game. They are now up to 85.1 percent on the PK, officially jumping the Colorado Avalanche for first in the NHL.
The Blackhawks are not likely going to jump enough teams to be a playoff team, but wins like this prove that they deserve to be in the conversation as a bubble team.
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What’s Next For The Blackhawks?
The Blackhawks are back in action on Friday night. They will host the Tampa Bay Lightning at the United Center on a cold night in Chicago.
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