Eurolanche

Blackhawks defeat Avalanche

The Chicago Blackhawks scored four goals in the second period in a 6-3 win against the Colorado Avalanche at United Center on Sunday for their seventh straight win.

Patrick Kane and Marian Hossa each scored two goals for the Blackhawks (27-13-4), who pulled within four points of the Dallas Stars for first place in the Central Division.

Kane, the NHL's leading scorer with 62 points, scored his 24th and 25th goals. Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews (one goal and two assists) and forward Andrew Shaw (two assists) each had multi-point games.

Corey Crawford made 34 saves to extend his season-high winning streak to five contests.

Matt Duchene scored his 20th and 21st goals and had an assist for the Avalanche (21-19-3), whose three-game win streak ended. Semyon Varlamov allowed four goals on 20 shots and was replaced by Calvin Pickard at 12:25 of the second after the Blackhawks went up 4-2 on Kane's second goal of the game to cap a power play.

Varlamov was 8-0-1 with a 1.48 goals-against average and .961 save percentage in his last 10 appearances against Chicago, but he has allowed eight goals in his past two outings (0-1-1).

Pickard made 13 saves.

Chicago scored first on Brandon Mashinter's goal at 8:27 of the first and improved to 24-3-2 when opening the scoring. Kane made it 2-0 at 16:22 with a wrist shot through traffic.

In the second, the Blackhawks built a 6-2 on goals by Hossa (twice), Kane and Toews.

Hossa made it 3-0 at 1:39 for his first goal since Dec. 6, a span of 14 games. Duchene scored the next two at 5:10 and 9:18 to pull the Avalanche within 3-2, but Chicago got three straight goals to close out the period.

After Kane's goal brought in Pickard, Toews scored with a slap shot at 14:31 and Hossa scored at 18:42 for a 6-2 lead.

Nathan Mackinnon scored his 15th goal of the season for Colorado at 15:02 of the third.

-- by NHL.com --