Feb. 22--If the Blackhawks wanted to go and hide somewhere Sunday, there was nowhere to run in the spacious venue of TCF Bank Stadium as the Wild trounced them 6-1. The Hawks looked like they would rather be anywhere else than playing another outdoor hockey game.
Over it?
Sunday was the Hawks' fourth outdoor game and the Wild's first. The Hawks players who spoke after the game all said the Wild came out with more energy and enthusiasm than the Hawks did.
Perhaps that had something to do with the Hawks just not caring as much for playing outdoors as they have in previous seasons. It was a notion captain Jonathan Toews did not dispel.
"I guess you can maybe look at it that way that they were really excited to be at home," Toews said. "Maybe the first game for a lot of those guys and maybe they used that to their advantage."
Goaltender Corey Crawford said Sunday was a game when nothing went right for the Hawks.
"They were all over the place," Crawford said. "I don't know, it seemed like there was no chemistry. It was just the other way. Maybe their team felt like they had the puck. They were playing fast. Just one of those games for us we couldn't get anything going."
Defensive lapses
Going into the trade deadline, the Hawks primary concern has been to acquire a top-six winger to play alongside Jonathan Toews and Marian Hossa when Hossa returns from injury.
But the way the Hawks' defense performed made the need for a top-four defenseman seem more urgent. Not that the Hawks will overreact to one game -- they still allow the seventh-fewest goals in the league -- but the blue line looked in need of help. Both Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook were on the ice for three Wild goals.
"I know I myself didn't execute very well tonight," rookie Trevor van Riemsdyk said. "Obviously that's not what we wanted. We've got to look at ourselves in the mirror here and come out the next couple of games and really show ourselves."
Corsi look
The Hawks led in overall Corsi 63-50 and in 5-on-5 Corsi 44-32. They even led in scoring adjusted Corsi 41.1 to 33.8 in 5-on-5, 59.3 to 53.7 across all situations, but Sunday was one of those games where the Wild's chances were of much higher quality than the Hawks. The Wild led in that category 20-7, according to war-on-ice.com.
