THREE THINGS: On the Mark, Power Shift and New Reality

The Blackhawks led twice on the night, but couldn't withstand a pair of one-goal comebacks from the Predators, falling in overtime on Tuesday, 3-2, in the first of a back-to-back in the Music City.
Dylan Strome netted his second of the season on the power play in the first, Mattias Janmark added his third in as many games in the second period and Malcolm Subban made a season-high 36 saves in the loss.

CHI at NSH
GAMECENTER: CHI at NSH
RECAP: Blackhawks Fall in OT, 3-2
GALLERY: Blackhawks at Predators
"Yeah, I think so," Calvin de Haan said when asked if Chicago let the game slip away. "Getting a point tonight is obviously big, that's points in four straight… It's frustrating. Subby played great. He gave us an opportunity to win and he stopped the pucks he needed to stop tonight, which was huge for us. It's annoying but getting a point's big for us."
"We turned the puck over too much, so it's difficult to defend," head coach Jeremy Colliton said after the game. "I think we did a decent job, particularly early in the game, of scrambling to get back in good position. We had some blocks, we had some saves, but you just can't defend that much. And we did. We weren't hard enough on the puck to advance it and we weren't hard enough on the puck to keep it down there and ultimately they just took the game over as it went on."

Here are three takeaways from the loss on Tuesday night:

ON THE (JAN)MARK

Throughout his NHL career, Mattias Janmark has largely been considered a bottom-six forward whose defensive responsibilities outweighed his offensive contributions. But Janmark set out this season to leave an new impression in his new home.
"I've always been an offensive player that takes care of the defensive end first, but I do consider myself an offensive player," Janmark told reporters back on October 12 after signing in Chicago. "The last two years really hasn't show (that). I'm really hoping to get some confidence back in the offensive zone and get that game going a little bit more because that's how I want to play."
Fast forward three-plus months, Janmark now finds himself tied with Patrick Kane and Pius Suter for the Blackhawks' lead in goals just two weeks into the season. All three of his goals have come in the last three games, too, including a second-period tally on Tuesday in Nashville after a promotion to the top line with Patrick Kane and Pius Suter in the absence of Alex DeBrincat.

"Early on, I didn't get much going but puck started coming to me last game and right now I fell pretty good," he said after the game. "I'm just a hard-working player, but I feel that I have a lot of offense in me. Last couple games I've been able to produce a little, so hopefully I keep doing that. I think there's a lot more, too. With the way we play, I think the ceiling is high, so hopefully I can keep getting better."
"Some of the things that he does are exactly what we need more of," Colliton said. "It's partly why we gave him the chance to play with Suter and Kane, because he is strong on the puck and he can drive it, he can protect it, he helps us establish offensive zone time, gives the whole a breather, doesn't just throw it away."
True to form, Janmark's tally on Tuesday came directly from his work in the defensive end, converting a pick-off-turned-breakaway chance for goal No. 3.
"We were hemmed in there, so just trying to stay in coverage and then I see him looking up at their D, so I baited him a little bit, maybe," he said. "I think I had a pretty good position on the D, just making sure he doesn't jump by me, but as soon as I see the pass coming, I try to jump on it and I think all the guys on the ice were tired, even them. That's when I think you can create those extra chances if have that ability late in the shift. That's where the game opens up. That was nice."
"That was a big goal for us," Colliton added. "That particular sequence, we had to defend for 20 seconds and we did a decent job and then you get a chance to catch them going the other way."

POWER SHIFT

For much of the season, Jeremy Colliton has preferred to us a puck-moving top power-play unit and a second group centered around the big shot of Dominik Kubalik. Both have carried the man advantage success at times through the opening six games, but with top-unit regulars DeBrincat and Adam Boqvist unavailable for duty, Colliton was forced to "jumble the units a little bit."
On Tuesday night, the hard-firing Kubalik was pulled up to the top unit (along with Duncan Keith, who has seen time on both), combining his shooting prowess with that group's puck movement. It took less than a minute of the game's opening power play for Chicago to find success up a man yet again. Keith fed Kubalik for a one-time blast at his established residence on the right circle, with Andrew Shaw quickly dishing the rebound across to Strome in the slot for the score. It was Chicago's lone full two-minute chance on the man advantage on the night, but a positive sign for the games ahead in a new look.
"We had that one chance and we found a way to get a puck to the net and recover it," Colliton said. "We've got to earn a couple more, but hopefully we can build on that."

NEW REALITY

Despite all the protocols in place and the abundance of safety teams take during the 2020-21 season, the reality is that in the midst of a pandemic, anything can happen. Two Central Division teams have already had to postpone games because of numerous positive tests, while many others around the league have seen players in and out of action due to the NHL's COVID-19 protocol.
On Monday, Chicago had their first brush with league protocol as Boqvist and DeBrincat were placed on the list of players unavailable because of positive tests, exposure or otherwise.
"We're doing the best we can, I think everyone is," Colliton said Tuesday of the situation. "That's the world we're living in right now. We're not in a bubble, so it's hard. It would've been naive to think that it wouldn't touch us at some point. We've got to make the best of it."
In Nashville, the absences meant that Lucas Carlsson made his season debut in place of Boqvist, logging 15:36 of ice time and one shot on goal while largely paired with the former's recent defensive partner, Keith. Matthew Highmore, who had been replaced on the fourth line by Brandon Hagel over the last three games, drew back into the lineup on the third line, with Janmark shifting up to the top line to replace DeBrincat. Highmore logged 8:49 of ice time including 57 seconds of penalty-kill time.
"It's a big opportunity for guys to step into bigger roles and fill in for us. No excuses right now. Every team is going through it," defenseman Nikita Zadorov said. "Detroit had five, six guys missing (over the weekend). Everybody has some guys missing (or) at some point they will have it if they don't. It's the world we're living in right now, so we've just got to let it go and just go out there and play hard, play hockey and try to win hockey games."