THREE THINGS: Energy Drain, Bright Spot and 'Miracle'

The Rangers spoiled the Blackhawks' homecoming.
A five-goal third period lifted the New York to a 6-3 victory over Chicago on Wednesday night at the United Center. The loss marked the Blackhawks' seventh in their last eight games and came on the heels of a 1-4-0 road trip.

CHI 3, NYR 6
WRITTEN
Full Box Score
RECAP: CHI 3, NYR 6
VIDEO
**HIGHLIGHTS**: CHI 3, NYR 6
**RAW**: Colliton on Loss to NYR
**RAW**: Kubalik on Two-Goal Night
**RAW**: Toews on Loss to NYR
**RAW**: Lehner on Third-Period Letdown
GALLERY
**GALLERY**: Blackhawks vs. Rangers
"Not good enough, obviously, from our end," Blackhawks coach Jeremy Colliton said. "(I) didn't love our first period, thought we had a decent second period, responded with some energy and compete and got ourselves back in the game. And then our third period, just nowhere near good enough, especially away from the puck. We just didn't have enough guys going, ultimately. We're a team that we need everyone going to compete. When we have everyone going, we have a good chance to win every night and that's just not what we had (Wednesday night). Very disappointed."
Mika Zibanejad (1G, 3A), Chris Kreider (1G, 2A) and Pavel Buchnevich (1G, 1A) each had a multi-point nights to lead the Rangers. The Blackhawks got two goals from Dominik Kubalik and a goal and an assist from Drake Caggiula but it wasn't enough as goaltender Robin Lehner yielded six goals on 41 Rangers shots.
"We've all got to play better," Lehner said. "We came out, had a so-so first period (Wednesday night) and have a pretty good second and then for some reason, that was just lost in the third. We've got to figure out why, because obviously we can play good hockey. But it's got to be consistent."
The Blackhawks again failed to gain any ground in the Western Conference postseason race as they fell to 26-26-8 on the season.
"We've got to stay positive and look at next game," Lehner said. "No one's feeling sorry for us, we've just got to be better."

Here are three takeaways from the Blackhawks' loss:

ENERGY DRAIN

To a man, the Blackhawks were disappointed in the energy level of the team during the loss to the Rangers.
Other than a strong second period, the Blackhawks weren't able to win many puck battles and couldn't get out of their own zone with any kind of consistency.
"To me, the story of the game (Wednesday night) is you're going to have games throughout the year where you don't have energy (and) where it's hard to find, (so) you have to find the motivation to go out there and play your best game," said captain Jonathan Toews, who had two assists for his 13th multi-point game of the season. "It's just a mental thing that you have to do and that's just the name of the game. Playing NHL hockey, that's one of the challenging things that if you want to make the playoffs and you want to be a winning team you're not going to feel at your best every night. There's going to be tough travel, tough schedule, a lot of adversity, things that pile up in your way and you've got to find a way to overcome it. We didn't do that."
Colliton didn't sugarcoat his reaction to the Blackhawks' lack of energy at a time in the season when they need every point they can get.
"(It) makes you angry, because it's a game that we looked for like we needed this game," Colliton said. "We didn't do the things right from the start to put ourselves in the best position to win. We just didn't have enough guys ready to play."
As far as still trying to climb into the race for the wild card, Colliton said, "we have to think really short-term. And that's (Thursday) - how are we going to prepare? Because we didn't prepare well enough. The coaches have to do a better job of preparing the team, the team needs to do a better job of preparing each other and individually they've got to do a better job of preparing themselves to play."

BRIGHT SPOT

On a night when not a lot went right for the Blackhawks, Kubalik continued his torrid goal-scoring pace. The winger notched his 24th and 25th goals of the season, six more than the next nearest rookie in the NHL.
After the game, Kubalik said his personal effort "is hard to talk about … when the (team) results are not there" but went on to praise linemates Toews and Caggiula for helping his scoring.
"Obviously, it's nice to score goals but I think it's about the line because we're playing in the offensive zone pretty well," said Kubalik, who is on pace for 32 goals this season. "We just found some chemistry between each other and that's pretty good."
On Kubalik's first goal, which tied the game at 1-1, Duncan Keith put a pass in the winger's wheelhouse and Kubalik rifled in a one-timer. The assist was the 500th of Keith's career and his 599th career point. Keith became the seventh Blackhawks player - and only defenseman other than Doug Wilson (554) - to reach 500 career assists.

USA! USA! USA!

In celebration of the 40th anniversary of the "Miracle on Ice" team that won the Gold Medal for Team USA at the 1980 Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, N.Y., former Blackhawks defenseman and key member of that U.S. team, Jack O'Callahan, dropped the ceremonial first puck.
Lining up for the faceoff were Blackhawks winger Patrick Kane and former teammate Artemi Panarin for the Rangers and O'Callahan made sure Kane won it.

"Well, I saw a Russian and an American facing off and I was like, 'There's not a chance I'm even going to risk this Russian winning that draw,'" O'Callahan said with a smile. "So I kind of looked at Kaner and I just fired it through his legs and he just kind of started to laugh. I'm sure he expected it. Even though we're generations apart, we're still teammates."
O'Callahan, who played for the Blackhawks from 1982-87, said "it's been a fun 40 years … of fun conversations with people" since the United States' stunning upset of the Russians in the semifinals followed by the win over Finland for the gold.
"We knew it was pretty special to a lot of people and we knew it was something that the country needed," O'Callahan said. "It just pulled the country together."