The Chicago Blackhawks will not only be looking for their second straight win on Sunday night when they welcome the Vancouver Canucks to the United Center, but they will also be looking for a measure of revenge after an embarrassing beatdown in British Columbia last month.
In that game, the Canucks notched six goals, and they were successful due in large part to their top line. Henrik and Daniel Sedin combined for four goals and five assists in the game, and they repeatedly found weak spots in a Chicago defense that didn’t do Corey Crawford any favors with their lackluster play.
The Blackhawks should hopefully have an easier time of things in this game, as their defense has shown some improvement over the last few games. They did lay an egg on Thursday night in Nashville, but other than that they’ve been able to limit shot opportunities and get good goaltending in their other efforts, leading to some key wins against divisional opponents.
The Blackhawks will obviously have to continue those trends if they’re going to win, but there is one other thing they have to make sure to do: keep capitalizing on power plays. They had five opportunities on the man-advantage in Friday’s win over the Winnipeg Jets, and they were able to score on two of them as they continued their recent run of power play success.
That area of the game is where Patrick Kane has been especially effective this season, and he’ll hope for more success on Sunday as he tries to extend his points streak to 26 games.
Kane isn’t the only Blackhawks player looking for milestones on Sunday night. Marian Hossa will be skating in his 1200th NHL game for the Hawks on Sunday, and Niklas Hjalmarsson will be playing in his 500th game.
