The three-game-sweep of the NHL from Wednesday starts in San Jose where the Sharks were coming off a successful road trip to face the Chicago Blackhawks.
The Sharks promptly reverted to old habits in a 5-2 loss as they made mistakes and turnovers throughout the game.
“Maybe on the road it was our best complete game,” Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville said. “I thought we had a really good game in Vancouver (on Saturday) with nothing to show for it. I thought today we got rewarded. Good back-to-back efforts as far as playing the right way and doing a lot of good things.”
Patrick Kane picked up two assists in the win and in the process extended his point streak to 17 games.
“It’s something if it ends, it ends,” Kane said of his streak. “I just want to play my game and make sure I’m doing the right things out there for the team. If it continues, it continues. I’m not too worried about it right now.”
Andrew Desjardins, Brent Seabrook, Jonathan Toews, Duncan Keith and Andrew Shaw scored for the Blackhawks.
“Turnovers were absolutely the difference in the first period,” Sharks coach Peter DeBoer said. “We cleaned it up after that. We were sloppy and a little soft in the in the first period and we paid for it. The story of the game was the first period and how we started.”
Corey Crawford made 27 saves for the road win; Chicago is on its annual Circus Trip.
“Obviously it felt good personally, but I think it felt good too, [because of] the time of the game,” Desjardins said. “They were starting to pour it on a little bit. It was good. I liked it. Any time you score against your former team, it’s a great feeling. That’s was the first one for me. So yeah, it felt great.”
Brent Burns and Patrick Marleau scored for San Jose and Martin Jones took the loss on 21 stops.
In Raleigh, Cam Ward was the first star of the game after making 30 saves in the Hurricanes 4-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers.
Jordan Staal, Elias Lindholm, Andrej Nestrasil, and Jeff Skinner scored for the Canes.
“The last few games have been up and down,” Skinner said. “Tonight, things all came together pretty smoothly.”
The Oilers were another team that reverted to old ways in the loss.
“Our goaltender was just fine,” Oilers coach Todd McLellan said. “He wasn’t capable of getting up in the forecheck or establishing a net-front presence or backchecking like he’s determined or winning a faceoff battle. He has to stay in the crease.”
Anders Nilsson had 23 saves in the loss and was left to dry on his own in the crease. The Oilers continue to fail to cover the defensive zone or backcheck coming down the ice.
“That’s a really, really disappointing effort for our hockey club,” McLellan said. “We did take a lot of steps forward (recently). I was very proud of our group. I still believe in the group. (But) we weren’t engaged physically. We were outworked. I don’t care how big you are; I don’t even care how skilled you are. It’s the determination factor that I’m looking for, and I don’t think we were very determined.
“[The Hurricanes] did a much better job playing collectively hard as a group, not giving us much, taking every inch of ice, playing over top of the puck. We had a lot of players who didn’t want to do that.”
In Buffalo, the visiting Nashville Predators also reverted to their old ways but in this case it was a good thing as they scored three goals in a 3-2 win over the Sabres.
Former Sabres, Cody Hodgson, scored the game-winner in the second period.
“Bourque (Gabriel Bourque) made a great play, a really sharp pass,” Hodgson said. “Just the way we play our defense, they are always in the play. He made a good play to jump the wall, and allowed the guy to cough it up to the middle. Jarnkrok made a good pass down to Bourque, who made a real good pass backdoor. I just had to tap it in.”
Hodgson had been waived by the Sabres in June and then signed with the Preds.
“I know people always want to do well in the buildings that they’re in and they came from for whatever the reason,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “Cody played a good game tonight; his line factored in a big goal for us.”
Mike Fisher and Craig Smith also scored for the Predators; the scoreless streak for Nashville had reached more than 227 minutes.
“I don’t think our guys were in panic to score goals,” Laviolette said. “I mean, we didn’t score any, but like I said, I’m a pretty honest guy; I’ll tell you how the first period was tonight and I’ll tell you the second period was better. But the games that we played, we did the right things and it didn’t go in for us, so we move on. Our guys are confident that we’re going to score goals. We weren’t going to get shut out the rest of the year; that would be impossible. … At some point we’re going to score a goal. I think there’s just a lot of confidence in our guys that they’re going to score. They do the right things, they put the puck at the net; it’s going to go in.”
Evander Kane and Jack Eichel scored for the Sabres who closed the 3-0 deficit late but it was too late as Buffalo lost its sixth straight.
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