TAMPA, Fla. _ Coach Joel Quenneville said the Lightning represented the Blackhawks' "toughest test" yet.
The Hawks passed that test, but they didn't quite get an "A" as the fell to the Lightning 3-2 in overtime.
Brayden Point scored the winning goal for the Lightning 3 minutes, 25 seconds into overtime on a 4-on-3 power play after Nick Schmaltz was in the penalty box for slashing. Patrick Kane had both Hawks goals.
The first period couldn't have gone much better for the Hawks. Kane kicked things off with his first goal of the night 3:49 into the game with a snipe of a wrist shot from the left circle. Kane went far side on Lightning goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy for his seventh goal of the season.
Then the Hawks were up against it shortly after Kane's goal. It started when John Hayden went off for a four-minute double-minor high sticking penalty on J.T. Brown at 5:49. It was Hayden's second double minor penalty in his last three games. The Hawks did fine killing off the first 3:16 of Hayden's penalties until Jonathan Toews got called for hooking. But the Hawks survived the ensuing 5-on-3 and killed off the remainder of Toews' penalty for a momentum-boosting string of kills against the league's top power play.
The penalty kill continued to impress after getting off to a strong start in the first 20 games.
Then the Hawks got a power-play goal during a 5-on-3 opportunity against the Lightning, with Kane scoring from a narrow angle below the right circle after a nice bit of passing from Duncan Keith and Cody Franson.
The Lightning came out with more intensity in the second period. The Hawks couldn't capitalize on a pair of power plays and the Lightning turned one of them into a short-handed goal. After a rare Kane turnover near the blue line, Lightning defenseman Victor Hedman raced to track down the puck, then left off a beautiful drop pass to Ryan Callahan who swung the puck over to Ondrej Palat for a one-time goal at 4:27. They also controlled play 5-on-5 and outshot the Hawks 10-6 for the period.
They picked up early in the third when Chris Kunitz managed to slide a puck between the legs of Crawford 31 seconds into the period.
