In Chicago, the Blackhawks’ Tyler Johnson scored at 8:19 of teh third period to snap a 2-2 tie with the visiting Colorado Avalanche and help send the Hawks to a 3-2 win on Tuesday night.
Petr Mrazek made 35 saves in the win
Chicago moved to 10-20-1.
“I think we have to grab it and use it,” Chicago coach Luke Richardson said of the win. “We can’t just sit on it and think that it just happened. It was a lot of hard work, and the guys stayed focused. Consistency’s a word we’ve been looking for this year, and tonight’s 60 minutes was really good.
“Couple power-play goals by them in the first period, but we made some adjustments, we had a big kill in the second and we stayed out of the box the rest of the way, which was smart. So, I think our guys were focused, which allowed us to play our physical game to the best we could.”
The two teams traded a pair of goals each in the opening stanza.
Chicago took a 1-0 lead on a marker from Ryan Donato at 7:29.
Colorado dropped to 19-11-2.
“It’s our awareness of what it takes to win hockey games,” Colorado defenseman Devon Toews said. “That’s the difference, having guys in this room self-aware that it takes 60 minutes, a hard game play to play against any team in this league. I don’t care who we’re playing. This league is so good. It’s hard to win any night against any team in this league. You have to show up. We’ve got guys in here who aren’t showing up right now.”
Valeri Nichushkin , who scored a double in th4 first period, tied it, 1-1, just ahead of the midway point of the period.
Nichushkin picked up his double two minutes later, off the power play, for a 2-1 lead to Colorado.
“We are missing some key guys that play important minutes for us, which doesn’t help,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “Every team is at this point, so it’s not an excuse, either. We’ve got 20 capable guys playing tonight. I just think it’s a mindset and a discipline to our game that we’re lacking on certain nights.”
Chicago’s Lukas Reichel scored at 12:56 of the first to tie it, 2-2, headed to the middle frame.
“Reichel was skating,” Richardson said. “I think that first goal probably gave him a lot of confidence. But even in the first period, he had a really strong play against them along our boards at the hashmarks and got the puck out. Just playing the right way comes back to you and you get some chances. He had some really nice chances in the second period as well.
“It was nice to see him have that. He’s been skating and working, but tonight he did all the right little, gritty things and he got rewarded with a goal and a couple other good chances.”
Alexandar Georgiev made 19 saves in the loss.
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