The Chicago Blackhawks refuse to lose, and continued that mindset Tuesday night by taming the Minnesota Wild 5-3, extending their points streak to a mind-blowing 29th game.
The Blackhawks are 20-0-3 and boast an NHL-high 43 points, 10 more than the next highest team, the Anaheim Ducks. The Wild are responsible for one of Chicago's three overtime losses, a 3-2 defeat on January 30th. This time around, the Blackhawks made their mark early on.
Minnesota struck first about eight minutes into the contest, when Devin Setoguchi scored his fifth goal of the season. It went downhill from there. At 13:02, Brandon Saad tied the game up 1-1, and Bryan Bickell scored the first of his two goals less than a minute later. At 17:12 Bickell scored again, followed by a Marian Hossa goal just over a minute later. Their vicious blitz turned a 1-0 deficit into a 4-1 lead in less than 20 minutes of play. It also forced Minnesota to pull Niklas Backstrom out of the net for Darcy Keumper, who was lights out in comparison. Keumper stopped 14 of the 15 shots sent his way, only getting bested by Patrick Kane at the 11:33 mark of the third period.
The Wild did make a run when Ryan Suter scored a goal three minutes into the third period that was followed by a Kyle Brodziak score at 10:32, cutting Chicago's lead to 4-3. Kane snuffed their momentum by scoring his only goal just a minute later.
The Blackhawks' dominance this year has not been because of a superstar lifting the team onto his back and carrying them. The only individual categories any Blackhawks rank in the top five of are save percentage, where Corey Crawford is second at .940, goals, where Patrick Kane (12 goals) is tied for fifth with eight other players, and game-winning goals where Marian Hossa ranks third alongside three other players with four. They have outscored their opponents by 31 goals.
The win over Minnesota was Chicago's tenth straight victory.
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