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RECAP: Bedard tallies three points in Blackhawks’ 5–4 loss to Islanders

  
RECAP: Bedard tallies three points in Blackhawks' 5–4 loss to Islanders
The Chicago Blackhawks fell to the New York Islanders 5–4 on the road on Thursday. (Photo courtesy of Bruce Bennett / Getty Images)

The Chicago Blackhawks could not overcome Arvid Soderblom surrendering five goals on 19 shots in a hard-fought 5–4 loss on the road to the New York Islanders. Connor Bedard scored his sixth goal of the season while adding two assists. Tyler Bertuzzi found the back of the net twice late as Chicago’s comeback fell short. Bertuzzi now has eight goals this season.

First period

Bedard opened the scoring in the first period on the power play with a wrist shot that beat Islander goaltender Ilya Sorokin at the 16:47 mark of the frame. Bedard found the puck on his stick after a wild pass from Alex Vlasic could not be corralled by the Islanders and Bedard scored a beautiful goal moving to his left while shooting right. The goal was assisted by Ryan Donato and Vlasic.

Chicago outshot New York 11–6 in the period and played well for most of the period.

Second period

New York scored twice in the middle period to take a 2–1 lead with goals from Dennis Cholowski and Simon Homlstrom. Chowolski took a nice pass from Holmstrom and fired a slap shot past Soderblom, a bad goal that beat him glove side. Holmstrom’s goal took a nice saucer pass from Ryan Pulock and fired home a snap shot that Soderblom apparently did not see as the puck was in the net before he could even make a true reaction.

Down 2–1 and after the second period of play while chasing the puck most of the period seemed like the tides were turning in favor of the home team.

Third period

New York scored three straight goals as Noah Dobson, Bo Horvat and Maxim Tsyplakov each beat Soderblom to give the Islanders what many thought would be a comfortable 5–1 lead. The good news, down four goals, was the substitution of Drew Commesso into the game and the exit of Soderblom, who has now given up 3-plus goals in four of his last five starts.

Commesso, a potential Blackhawks goaltender when the rebuild is over, stopped both shots he faced in his first NHL game action.

Just over halfway in the period, T.J. Brodie fired home a slap shot behind Sorokin to cut the Islander lead to 5–2. The goal, assisted by Bedard and Nick Foligno, gave the newly acquired defenseman his first goal of the season.


Chicago would get two goals in a minute from Bertuzzi to cut the Islander lead to 5–4 with 10 seconds to play in the game, making the score appear better than the actual play on the ice.

The last-place Blackhawks travel to Newark, New Jersey, to take on the New Jersey Devils for a 12 p.m. CST puck drop. Fans can potentially see the game on the NHL Network, CHSN or MSGSN unless management and companies decide they cannot.

Analysis

After what many fans thought was the coming-out party of Soderblom has turned into a mess over his last five appearances. In this time, the 25-year-old has faced 118 shots while stopping 103 for a whopping .872 save percentage.

Bedard continued to show his offensive skills with a three-point night, giving the young phenom 85 points in 97 career games as he approaches the 100-game mark for his career.

Chicago lost 72.7% of the faceoffs in the game and it showed, as they were chasing the puck most of the night. Some will argue faceoffs do not matter, but just like winning the coin flip in overtime in football, no coach would rather lose the faceoff than win it.

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