Nick Foligno Ends Drought With Big Night, But Blackhawks Fall 4-3 In Shootout To Nashville

Foligno, Chicago's 36-year-old de facto captain, had two goals and assist as the Hawks loose fourth straight, but earn a point.

Nick Foligno was busy signing autographs for his young sons' hockey team at the United Center before the Blackhawks hosted the Nashville Predators on Tuesday. See the video in the link: https://x.com/NHLBlackhawks/status/1732211706632249833?s=20

Landon and Hudson Foligno, along with their teammates, then got to watch the Blackhawks' No. 1 Dad come through once the puck dropped.

Nick Foligno ended a 13-game goal and seven-game point drought with two goals and an assist. He set up Chicago's Jason Dickinson's eighth goal of the season. 

But it wasn't enough. All three Nashville shooters — Gustav Nyquist, Ryan O'Reilly and Filip Forsberg — beat Arvid Söderblom in the shootout and the Predators prevailed 4-3.  

Connor Bedard solved Juuse Saros in his first shootout attempt in the NHL, but Chicago went on to lose its fourth straight and 10th in 12.

The Blackhawks don't have a captain this season after Jonathan Toews left hockey, at least for 2023-24. Foligno, who wore a "C" at Columbus for six years, is one of Chicago's alternates and has stepped up as the rebuilding team's most vocal leader.

"Every guy in here wants to do well," Foligno said after Chicago fell to 7-16-1. "I think that's the hard part, that we're not getting the result.

"Yeah, we can look at it, hey, we got a point tonight. But you don't want to let these ones slip away when you have half a chance."

The line of Foligno, Dickinson and recent call-up Joey Anderson was Chicago's strongest throughout the night. The trio combined for six shots and attempted six more that were blocked or missed.

"They're hard to play against and they have the ability to score when the other team maybe gets a little bit loose or turns the puck over," Chicago coach Luke Richardson said. "They're very responsible, so I like them against, you know the Forsberg and Nyquist and O'Reilly line."

Foligno opened the scoring 5:57 into the first period. His stuff-in from the right side of the net rolled over Saros' shoulder, down his back and into the net.

Luke Evangelista and Mark Jankowski scored 26 second apart off Blackhawks breakdowns early in the second to put Nashville ahead 2-1.

Evangelista swept in Tyson Barrie's rebound from the side of the net at 2:11 to tie it at 1 after spare defenseman Nikita Zaitsev failed to clear the puck up the boards. 

Jankowski made it 2-1 at 2:37 when he broke in past Connor Murphy after Colton Sissons lifted the puck past the Chicago defenseman.

"We have to clean that up," Foligno said. "We're up 1-0 and now we're down 2-1, just bang-bang. Those are the ebbs and flows of the game where we can't bleed so long."

This time, the Blackhawks bounced back quickly though and didn't fall apart, as they've often done over the past month.

Dickinson rifled in his eighth goal 32 seconds later, beating Saros with a rising from the left circle to it it at 2.

Foligno popped in his second goal on a point-blank rebound of  Anderson's shot just over 2 minutes later to put Chicago ahead, 3-2.

O'Reilly's power-play goal, a backhanded tap in from the left side tied it at 3 with 7:01 left in the period.

"They were able just to crawl back in the game every time and that's too bad," Foligno said. "It's on us to try to find a way here. We're far enough into this (season), we know how we have success.

"In order for us to move the needle to where we need it to, we've got to show sustained flashes. We've got to do that the whole game, even a whole period right now."

Saros and Söderblom made several sharp saves to keep it deadlocked through the third and send it to overtime.