Hawks holiday home-cooking?

CHICAGO | Ah, before you raise the ol' reliable pot-stirrer of a goaltender controversy, hear Corey Crawford out concerning the Blackhawks' recent pratfalls on defense that slowed down their effort to separate themselves from most opponents in points piled up.

"You can't blame one guy or certain guys," Crawford said. "It's a team effort to play defensively. Obviously, as a goaltender, you try to take more responsibility because that's what you take pride in - stopping pucks and having no goals against. We're not trying to point fingers at anyone. Everyone is trying to take care of themselves and worry about what their job is.

"Breakdowns will happy to every team. If you watch video, I can easily show you great plays we made defensively, of guys getting back, blocking shots. I don't think it's a huge problem. I'm confident our guys can do the job."

It's certainly not early anymore to where it's getting too late. The Hawks are light years ahead of their muddling, .500-hugging pace at this point last season during the salary cap-induced Stanley Cup hangover.

They seem primed for another Cup run with some of the NHL's best scoring power. Yet some of their recent efforts have been dreadful, absolute wipeouts as if the Hawks were hardly better than an expansion team with defensive collapses and a torrent of goals-against flurries.

After a 4-1 loss Tuesday to the Phoenix Coyotes that kicked off a heavy home schedule in December, the Hawks had surrendered the fifth-most goals in the NHL, and second in the Western Conference only to bottom-feeding Columbus Blue Jackets. Comparatively few were bad goals let in by Crawford.

In perhaps a statistical anomaly, both the Hawks and Toronto Maple Leafs had passed the 14-win, 30-points mark barely outscoring the opposition. The Hawks had tallied 80 goals. The Leafs had run up 82 goals while allowing 81.

Through the Coyotes game, the Hawks had allowed five or more opposition goals five times this season-- three on the recently-completed "circus trip" through the Western Conference. Back-to-back 5-2 and 9-2 losses to Calgary and Edmonton were the worst of the season. Yet in other games, the Hawks have had to outscore their opponents rather than playing clean, buttoned-down 2-1 and 3-2 contests.

"We have enough firepower, enough goals in our room that we should be always be OK creating offense," winger Patrick Sharp said. "It's the defensive side of the game that kind of bothers us as players, and it bothers the coaches."

Despite the team-effort mantra, Crawford owns up to his part in the choppy defensive effort.

"I've felt that I've been kind of up and down," he said. "I feel my game has to get a little more consistent. If I'm not letting in as many goals, that's just going to carry over to more offense."

The numbers bear him out. Crawford had a 2.30 goals-against-average and .917 saves percentage last season. To date, he was at 2.86 and .898.

"I thought he had an outstanding October (but) last month, not the same caliber," said coach Joel Quenneville. "The last 30-something games last year, he was outstanding. He started the same way this year."

This month is the best time to quiet the defensive hiccup, Crawford's teammates agreed.

"I'm confident in our team," Sharp said. "We can be a strong team in all 82 games. There's games we'd like to put behind you and forget about it and move on. We do a good job learning from those games and trying to get something out of it.

"We have a big stretch of (home) games. And it would be nice to get on a roll and win a bunch of them."