Lohrei Scores Two as Bruins Surge Past Blackhawks for 6th Straight Win

CHICAGO – Mason Lohrei, celebrating his 25th birthday, scored two goals to help the Boston Bruins win their sixth straight game, 5-2 against the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Saturday.

It was the defenseman’s first multigoal game in the NHL.

“Yeah, a lot of fun,” said Lohrei, whose sister, Zoe, read the lineups in the locker room before the game as part of the Bruins’ siblings trip. “I live pretty close to here, too, so my whole family is here. A lot of friends made the trip, and obviously siblings trip, too, so a pretty special day. I won’t forget it.”

Joonas Korpisalo made 22 saves for the Bruins (28-19-2), who rallied from down 2-0 in the first period for their eighth win in their past nine games. Pavel Zacha, Casey Mittelstadt, David Pastrnak and Elias Lindholm each had two assists.

“You just never know,” said Boston coach Marco Sturm of his team falling behind and then rallying. “The frustrating part was because we played so well … All of sudden we were down 2-0. Again, good feeling today. Guys had a good energy. Maybe it was the siblings. I don’t know. But we got the job done because we just played our game.”

Ryan Greene put the Blackhawks ahead 1-0 at 16:14 of the first period, three seconds after a Chicago power play expired. Greene scored on a wrist shot from the slot after taking a pass from Andre Burakovsky at the bottom of the left face-off circle.

Wyatt Kaiser made it 2-0 at 18:14. The defenseman skated in from the right point, moved into the slot and put a wrist shot past Korpisalo’s stick side.

Charlie McAvoy brought the Bruins to within 2-1 at 1:55 of the second period. Lindholm passed the puck in front to McAvoy, who scored on a wrist shot past a screened Soderblom.

“I’ve been trying to jump in the play more recently, responsibly, trying to be a threat, trying to be part of it,” McAvoy said. “I think it’s been effective. It’s been going well. I’ve been able to contribute when I get down there. That was a great play off the rush by them (his teammates), a heads-up play by ‘Lindy’ to slip it over to me. That started rolling the snowball down the hill.”

Lohrei tied the game 2-2 at 14:41, taking a cross-ice pass from Hampus Lindholm and scoring on a wrist shot from the right circle. Lindholm was activated off injured reserve earlier in the day after missing six games with an undisclosed injury.

The Bruins took a 3-2 lead at 19:14, with Viktor Arvidsson finishing a give-and-go with Zacha and putting the puck into the net from just off the crease.

Lohrei scored his second on the power play at 9:01 of the third period, moving in from the left point and scoring on a wrist shot for a 4-2 Bruins lead.

Marat Khusnutdinov made it 5-2 at 11:02, finishing after Pastrnak's pass to him in front to finish a rush.

“It’s huge,” Lohrei said of the victory. “A lot of other teams are winning games, and we’ve got to stick with it and keep climbing and put ourselves in a good spot here going into the (Olympic) break and then coming back and really making a push and proving to everybody that we’re a playoff team. We all know we are. I think it’s just going out there every night and playing 60 minutes of good solid hockey.”

NOTES: Pastrnak had his 100th multi-assist game and became the 10th Bruins player to reach the milestone. … He became the fifth Czech player to record 100 multi-assist games, following Jaromir Jagr (266), Jakub Voracek (125), Patrik Elias (119) and David Krejci (106).