The Chicago Blackhawks put up one of their better efforts in weeks, but a two-minute stretch in the third period that saw the New York Islanders score three times gave New York a wide enough lead that held off a furious Blackhawks comeback, preserving the Islanders’ 5-4 lead.
Bedard Opens the Scoring
Blackhawks’ Connor Bedard opened the scoring on the power play near the end of the first period. A missed pass nearly led to the Islanders clearing it, but Ryan Donato took the loose puck and found Bedard, who made a nice deke and fired a wrister past Islanders’ netminder Ilya Sorokin to give the Blackhawks a 1-0 lead.
Now that's a patented Connor Bedard wrister ™️ pic.twitter.com/R50Kuhrlqv
— NHL (@NHL) December 13, 2024
It was Bedard’s sixth goal of the season and his first since Dec. 1 against the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Islanders Storm Back
Midway through the second period, with an Islanders power play expiring, New York defenseman Dennis Cholowski clapped a bomb from the point, beating Blackhawks’ goaltender Arvid Soderblom to tie it at one.
Related: Blackhawks News & Rumors: Sorensen, Korchinski, Nazar, Roenick
With five minutes left in the second, Islanders’ winger Simon Holmstrom fired a long-distance shot past Soderblom to take the lead. Holmstrom, a first-round pick in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft, now has eight goals on the season and is well on pace to break his career-high mark of 15.
Islanders, Blackhawks Open the Floodgates
As mentioned earlier, a 2:19 stretch in the third period gave the Islanders a 5-1 lead, with goals from Noah Dobson, Bo Horvat and Maxim Tsyplakov. Despite the massive lead, the Blackhawks were still outshooting New York 20-17.
Chicago went on a flurry of its own, starting with T.J. Brodie scoring his first goal as a Blackhawk and then Tyler Bertuzzi scoring twice in a minute to make it 5-4 with 10 seconds to go.
New York held off whatever was left of a Chicago comeback to earn the win.
The Islanders are now 12-12-7 with 31 points, while the Blackhawks fall to 9-18-2 with 20 points.
Next Up
The Blackhawks will drive up the road to Newark to face the New Jersey Devils on Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m./12 p.m. CT.
Meanwhile, the Islanders will take a few days to relax before flying to the Windy City to face the Blackhawks on Sunday at the United Center. Puck drop is 3 p.m. ET / 2 p.m. CT.
