CHICAGO — The Chicago Blackhawks jumped out to a 1-0 lead on the Calgary Flames but allowed three unanswered goals and lost their fourth straight game 5-1 on Sunday at the United Center.
Hawks goalie Arvid Söderblom made his first career start, and Marc-André Fleury backed him up in his first game back from the COVID-19 protocol.
A Hawks team that hadn’t lost back-to-back games under interim coach Derek King through the first half of December now finds itself in a four-game slide — and outscored 11-2 in the last two — and they can blame some of the usual culprits.
Namely special teams and turnovers.
Not only did the Hawks cough up the eighth goal in their last 17 penalty kills when Elias Lindholm scored in the second period, but before the break they allowed a short-handed goal by Trevor Lewis during another punchless power play (0 for 2 on Sunday and 1 for the last 14).
The Hawks committed three penalties in the second period and allowed 26 shots on goal.
From the outset, Henrik Borgström seemed to give an extra spark to the top line with Patrick Kane and Alex DeBrincat, and the three got the Hawks off to a good start.
Borgström held on to the puck through traffic and fired on Jacob Markström from the slot, then dug the puck out of a board battle to Kane as he roamed behind the net. For the 11th time this season, Kane set up DeBrincat for a goal as the primary assist.
DeBrincat’s wrister put the Hawks up 1-0, but Matthew Tkachuk snapped a goal in the side pocket 3½ minutes later after a Kane giveaway.
Söderblom had an up-and-down night. He was a beat late sliding to the post to cut off Tkachuk’s first-period goal, but he made seven straight stops in less than two minutes in the second and shut down Dillon Dube’s penalty shot in the third.
The Hawks pulled Söderblom with 2 minutes left, and Oliver Kylington added an empty-netter. Söderblom came back in net, and Johnny Gaudreau scored on him with 1:26 left.
Söderblom had 37 saves and Markström had 30.
