NHL Game Recap: Hall's Hat Trick Sparks Blackhawks Past Stars

The Blackhawks delivered an electrifying performance on Wednesday, November 27th at United Center, dominating the Stars. Taylor Hall completed his fifth NHL career hat trick to help the Hawks spark past the Stars, Louis Crevier scored his first NHL goal, and Connor Bedard put an end to his 12-game goal drought when he extended Chicago’s lead to 3-0. Teuvo Teravainen also scored for the Blackhawks, and both Colin Blackwell, former Blackhawk, and Matt Duchene scored the two Dallas goals. With this loss, the Stars have now lost two games straight after two wins straight. The Blackhawks head to Minnesota on Friday to take on the Wild, and the Stars head home to Dallas to host the Colorado Avalanche.

Chicago Blackhawks Lineup:

Hall – Bedard – Kurashev

Bertuzzi – Donato – Teravainen

Foligno – Dickinson – Mikheyev

Maroon – Reichel – Smith

Vlasic – Murphy

Kaiser – Martinez

Brodie – Crevier

Mrazek

Soderblom

Dallas Stars Lineup:

Robertson – Duchene – Dadonov

Marchment – Johnston – Seguin

Benn – Blackwell – Stankoven

Back – Steel – Bourque

Heiskanen – Lindell

Harley – Lyubushkin

Smith – Dumba

DeSmith

Oettinger

Only 17 seconds into the opening period, Taylor Hall got the party started when he scored his third goal of the season to put the Blackhawks in front 1-0. Hall skated into the offensive zone after carrying the puck through the neutral zone before entering the Stars’ zone, he then cut to the left face-off circle and scored on a wrist shot. The Stars got the puck out of their zone, however, the Hawks kept it in and Casey DeSmith got ahold of the puck, trying to send it to one of his teammates but Ryan Donato got it, and passed it to Hall, who jammed it past DeSmith from the goal line with 14:17 on the clock in the first period.

Connor Bedard extended the lead to 3-0 just 41 seconds into the second period when he took a pass from Tyler Bertuzzi, who initially received the puck off a pass from Bedard, who got knocked down by Ilya Lyubushkin. Bertuzzi carried the puck around Blackwell and sent it back to Bedard, who fired a wrist shot over Casey DeSmith’s glove. At 16:54, Teuvo Teravainen pushed it to 4-0 when he took a pass back from Tyler Bertuzzi, scoring from the slot. This had been Teravainen’s sixth goal of the season. Colin Blackwell responded not long after the fourth Chicago goal at 16:19, cutting it to 4-1. He backhanded the puck into the top of the net after a shot by Miro Heiskanen’s shot from the right point had stopped in front of the net. Completing his hat trick at 11:18 of the middle frame – Taylor Hall made it a 5-1 lead for the Hawks when Craig Smith, who helped dig the puck out of the corner on the right, fed Hall in front to finish his fifth career hat trick. Louis Crevier increased Chicago’s lead to 6-1 with his first NHL career goal when he was fed by Ilya Mikheyev, who carried the puck through the neutral zone and into the Stars’ zone, passing it to Crevier, who skated into the slot and scored.

Late in the third period, Matt Duchene picked up his 12th goal of the season when he scored on the power play for Dallas at 6:17 for the 6-2 final.

Taylor Hall on his hat trick, the win, and the game overall: “11 years. It’s been a long time. You know, you don’t come into games expecting to score hat tricks, but I’ve been working pretty hard. I’ve been pretty happy with how I’ve been playing and my effort. Being put on that line, I wanted to play well and show well, obviously, and we needed to win. We needed to win on home ice… Just as a group, a lot of guys got on the board, Connor and myself – you need that. You know, as a hockey player, as an offensive guy, sometimes it’s not enough to just play well – you need to see some results from it. Hopefully, this can kind of springboard our whole offensive game as a team.”

Louis Crevier on his first career goal, and how he felt throughout the game: “Pretty good. I’ve been waiting a long time, so it’s awesome. – It was fun to play with the lead, that probably gave me some confidence… it was a really cool night,” – “I felt good. I mean, early, I was a bit nervous about this game in the United Center for a while for me, but I think I found my game early. I was able to put on a good performance. A goal is a little cherry on the top, right?”

Connor Bedard on his goal, how he feels, the team needing this win, and the three-game stretch: “Just kind of relieved. I mean, it’s been like a month. I don’t know if I’ve had a stretch like that in my life, so it felt good to see one go in. – I don’t know when we had over three goals really last, so it’s good to see a bunch go in. I thought the best part of the game probably was the third – we didn’t really sit back. We kept going at them and just tried to keep the same game,” – “There’s so many games and you can’t look at a three-game stretch too much. I mean, for us, we got to keep building on what we’re doing well and try to improve what we’re not.”

Matt Duchene on the game overall: “I don’t think it was maybe as bad as the score. It got away from us. We had some good chances, and their goalie came up big at some times. We just had some errors that ended up in our net. It’s that old adage: You’re never really as good as you think you are when you win, and you’re never as bad as you think you are when you lose, most of the time,” – “This team, I don’t think, has had a ton of adversity the last two years. A little bit is coming at us right now. As long as we peak at the right time and work towards it, I think that’s the only thing we can do. We’ve just got to keep figuring things out and working and pushing.”

Notes:

– Taylor Hall’s fifth career hat trick had been his first since December 5th, 2013. …Hall is the fifth player in NHL history to go 10 years between hat tricks, regular season or playoffs. He joins Dit Clapper (March 9th, 1933-February 17th, 1945), Woody Dumart (December 25th, 1939-March 4th, 1951), Guy Carbonneau (January 6th, 1983-December 27th, 1993), and Matt Duchene (November 4th, 2011-November 20th, 2021).

– Hall’s goal to put Chicago in a 1-0 lead just 17 seconds into the opening period was the fastest opening goal for the Blackhawks since February 9th, 2020 when Dominik Kubalik scored 15 seconds into the first period. …He also scored the two fastest goals by a Blackhawks player since February 18th, 2019 – Alex Debrincat (5:07).

– Tyler Bertuzzi picked up a pair of assists, and Petr Mrazek made a total of 25 saves for Chicago.

– Connor Bedard’s 12-game drought-ending goal was his first since a 4-2 loss against the Stars in Dallas on October 26th.

– Casey DeSmith made a total of 20 saves for Dallas.

– The Stars played without Roope Hintz after “tweaking something” on Monday, according to Pete DeBoer.