Nick Foligno holding rebuilding Blackhawks to high standard as team st…
Nick Foligno holding rebuilding Blackhawks to high standard as team struggles to find identity originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago
The Chicago Blackhawks ended a five-game losing streak on Friday with a memorable multi-goal comeback win in overtime against the Toronto Maple Leafs, which featured a Jason Dickinson hat trick and Kevin Korchinski scoring the winner. It was the kind of victory that could have served as a springboard of some sort.
Well, the Blackhawks followed that up with a lackluster start against a middle-of-the-pack St. Louis Blues team, which scored three goals in the first period, including two in the first five and a half minutes. The Blackhawks lost 4-2, and the players seemed to have another meeting after the game to address the inexcusable start.
“Disappointing,” Nick Foligno, who’s essentially the Blackhawks’ de-facto captain, said after the game. “I didn’t like our start. We talked about this, it’s building winning habits in here, and understanding what those are. I understand in the sports world, a lot of cliches get thrown around, like, words, buzzwords, but there is a definition behind a lot of them and commitment behind it, and that’s what we have to learn here.
“It’s just how to do it over and over again, and we talk about it. Sometimes it’s not fun or exciting, but it’s how you win in this league. And tonight, we gave them those goals in a lot of ways, right? We’re not over checks, we’re not reloading and then boom, boom, boom, they’re in the back of the neck.
“And then we push back and we get our game going, we get a goal, but then we just don’t sustain it. It’s a disappointing one, because we felt like we were understanding of how we had success against Toronto, and now we’re right back in the loss column.”
The Blackhawks are the only team in the NHL this season that hasn’t won consecutive games yet. They’re back to square one.
“It’s just not good enough,” said Ryan Donato, who scored a goal in the loss. “Obviously we hold…
