For just the second time this year, the Blackhawks were set to face the very talented Kings. For the Kings, this was a bad time to come to the UC because the Hawks are smoking hot. The Kings came in 3-1-1 in their last 5, but only 4-5-1 in their last 10 so they are certainly heating up. After the slopfest that happened the other night against Columbus, the Hawks were in for a much different challenge. The Kings are strong in all aspects despite their latest scoring struggles and were recently turned over to former Hawks coach Darryl Sutter.
The first period was a very streaky one, as the Kings opened up with 6 straight PP minutes, and then followed by the Hawks getting 4 of their own, but neither team capitalized. The Kings were able to score the only goal of the second, and out shot the Hawks 15-10 to put their shot total at 28 after just 40 minutes. The Kings added and insurance goal in the third, and the Hawks weren't able to solve the Kings netminder sending the Kings home 2-0 winners.
- MegaMayers had a great chance on the Sharpie double minor, early in the first period. His speed was excellent as he whizzed past the Kings defense, but ran out of gas and had his shot partially blocked.
- Crawford made a HUGE penalty shot save on Mike Richards, in the second period, on a questionable call against El Capitan. It shouldn't be forgotten that Seabrook got caught pinching on the play and left Tazer out at the point with no stick.
- Credit must be given to both goaltenders, but Jon Quick was outstanding. There are at least a couple of times that he snuffed out sure goals. Crawford kept the Hawks close, and without his solid play, it would have been 5-0.
- Trent Hunter put the Kings up 1-0 in the second period. Kyle Clifford was able to knock a loose puck out from Crawford's reach and then looked to interfere with Crawford's effort to make the followup save. Hunter found the juicy puck and buried it. I call shenanigans.
- Jarret Stoll put the Kings up 2-0 on a 3rd rebound chance. If a team gets a third crack at a rebound, the chances aren't good that it'll stay out of the net. I'm not sure I can describe just what Leddy and Hammer were doing on this play, with the both of them ending up minus 2 on the night.
- Because of Big Slow's inadequacy and simple mind MegaMayers and Frodo were limited to under 10 minutes of TOI. The cascade effect Scott is having, just throws the whole bottom six into disarray.
- Well, just when I start warming up to Big Slow playing forward, he takes a complete cement head penalty in the offensive zone trying to take on four Kings, to leave the Hawks shorthanded. In his defense a Kings player should have joined him, but c'mon, man. Luckily they killed the powerplay off, but this play threw the momentum into the Kings favor. 3:20 of playing time is simply fucking pointless, Q. He played a total of 5 shifts after his dumb ass penalty, including a 5 second shift. Really? This is how this situation is going to go down?
- During a second period scrum the it looked like the fucking circus out on the ice. The Kings Clifford purposely kicked Crawford's stick half way across the rink, for which he was not penalized, but Frank the Tank had the presence of mind to bring it back. Once Tank got to the other end of the ice he missed a feed that was sent back his way, which led to a few odd man chances in the Hawks end. Thankfully, Crawford was EXCELLENT, but the Hawks D men were playing hot potato.
- Twenty eight shots against, at home, in two periods is just unacceptable. Crawford is the only reason it wasn't 4-0 at that point. They ended up giving up 38 shots, which is about 10 too many.