THREE THINGS: The Cat & the Bat, Carl Comes Through and Road Trippin'

After seeing their late-third-period lead evaporate on Thursday night to the Blue Jackets in a 6-5 loss, the Blackhawks returned the favor on Saturday with a late equalizer and then overtime winner to cap a 3-2 victory over Columbus at the United Center.
Nicolas Beaudin scored his second goal in as many games, Carl Soderberg tied things up with 3:45 to play and Alex DeBrincat batted the winner out of mid-air in overtime for the win.

"It's huge," DeBrincat said. "We kind of gave up two points that last game and obviously we wanted to come out strong tonight. I don't think we necessarily played our best game but we gave ourselves a chance and we obviously came out on top in overtime. That's pretty big for us."
"As a whole team we were disappointed in the result the other night," said Kevin Lankinen after the 29-save victory. "I think the way we bounced back, we played a good game today and brought home the win. That was perfect revenge from the other night."

Here are three takeaways from the win:

CAT AND THE BAT

DeBrincat stayed red-hot on Saturday night, batting the game-winning goal out of mid-air to take the second standings point in overtime. It was his third game-winner in the last five games.
"They turned it over and I saw a 2-on-2 going with Kaner," he said of the play. "Just gave it to him. Good things happen when he has the puck. He was able to get it through, and it bounced up off my stick, and I just wanted to just put it toward the net. It worked out this time, but pretty lucky."
"He's got another level that he's reached here," head coach Jeremy Colliton said. "We all see the offensive production and that's what gets the headlines -- and he can do it. You can never have enough guys who produce and produce in big moments."
The forward now has 11 points (6G, 5A) in six games since coming off the COVID-19 Protocol List on Feb. 2.

CARL COMES THROUGH

It largely wasn't the opening month to the season that Carl Soderberg expected when he signed with the Blackhawks on Dec. 26. He missed all of training camp and the opening week of the season with visa and immigration issues, and then a league-mandated seven-day quarantine upon arrival in Chicago.
He got into his first game on Jan. 24 against Detroit, but coming into a new team, a new system and without many practices and no exhibition tilts to get up to speed, coming into Saturday night it had been a quiet opening 10 games with one assist to his name.
"You need battles and you need pretty much everything," Soderberg said Saturday morning. "To just jump right into it, it took me like six, seven games to start to win battles. I felt better the last week or so and I think my game is starting to get there."
It got there officially with 3:45 left on the clock in the third when he got the puck in the high slot, turned and put the game-tying goal in off the post with his first tally as a Blackhawk.
"It was great to get that out of the way," he said after the win. "Overall, I felt like that was the best game so far -- winning battles, good faceoffs and was around the net the whole night.
Soderberg also went 12-for-15 on the faceoff dot not the night, becoming just the sixth NHL player this season to carry at least an 80% success rate in a game with at least 15 draws.
"I was going against the same guys and won a lot," he said. "That started my game and then was nice to finish it off there to tie the game."

ROAD TRIPPIN'

Following a home-heavy two-weeks stretch with six of the last eight games of the United Center, the Blackhawks will embark on a nearly two-week road trip to Detroit, Carolina and Columbus beginning on Monday night in the Motor City.
On the other side of the trip, Chicago returns home for eight days before another two-week excursion to face Dallas, Florida and Tampa Bay. All told, the next five weeks will account for 43% of the team's entire road slate this season, with just eight road games total remaining over the final seven weeks of the year.
"It's boring, that's for sure," Dylan Strome said of mental struggle with the largely hotel-bound road life this season. "We've got to stay in our hotel rooms. Each team has a little team lounge that they've got set up in each hotel, so they've got a pretty good setup for us there, but you've got to wear your mask, got to be safe, do the right things and stay healthy."
"We know the rules, we follow them, do the right thing (and) do the best we can to prepare," Colliton added. "It's up to us to find a way to get it done."