The Blackhawks ended their six-game losing streak with a 4-3 shootout win against the Dallas Stars on Saturday night.

The Blackhawks opened the scoring 3:20 into the opening period. On their first shot of the game, Tyler Bertuzzi finished a give-and-go with Alex Vlasic, snapping a quick shot past Jake Oettinger to give the Blackhawks an early 1-0 lead.

making it look easy🔥 pic.twitter.com/dleGlznCEl

— Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) December 28, 2025

The Stars tied the game at 11:31 of the opening frame. Mikko Rantanen set up Nils Lundkvist for a one-timer from the point that sailed through traffic and found the back of the net, tying the game at 1–1.

Hammered it 🔨 pic.twitter.com/Tr6hL44PJf

— Dallas Stars (@DallasStars) December 28, 2025

The Blackhawks regained the lead midway through the second period thanks to Jason Dickinson. Artyom Levshunov broke up a Stars zone entry and Dickinson took the puck the other way, weaving into traffic before beating Oettinger with a wrist shot from between the circles to make it 2-1.

ooooohhhh my goodness🤩 pic.twitter.com/qsGxHyVNcy

— Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) December 28, 2025

That lead lasted just 55 seconds: Justin Hryckowian evened the game for the Stars by chipping in a loose puck after Wyatt Johnston rang a snap shot off the left post, knotting things back up at 2-2.

Hard to the net 😤 pic.twitter.com/XSAry92N9S

— Dallas Stars (@DallasStars) December 28, 2025

The Stars grabbed their first lead of the night at 11:18 of the third period. A turnover from Ryan Greene led to a Johnston shot, and Rantanen pounced on the rebound, shoveling it past a sprawling Arvid Soderblom to give the Stars a 3-2 advantage.

Can’t stop Mikko 🫡 pic.twitter.com/Uue1cUB0Qq

— Dallas Stars (@DallasStars) December 28, 2025

Bertuzzi responded quickly for the Blackhawks, scoring at 12:25 of the third. Vlasic’s point shot deflected off Connor Murphy in the slot and slid to Bertuzzi at the top of the crease, where he buried it to tie the game 3-3.

Tyler Bertuzzi leads the NHL in goals on the road with 14 goals this season🔥 pic.twitter.com/c00K9rzyxE

— Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) December 28, 2025

After a scoreless overtime, the Blackhawks pulled out a 4–3 shootout win. Ryan Donato and Nick Lardis converted in the shootout, while Soderblom turned aside all but one Stars attempt.

🚨NICK LARDIS SHOOTOUT WINNER🚨 pic.twitter.com/a6VA5hgvzF

— Blackhawks on CHSN (@CHSN_Blackhawks) December 28, 2025

Notes

Historically, the Blackhawks haven’t been great in first games back from breaks, but they played a respectable, high-effort game tonight.

First period was pretty back-and-forth, with the Blackhawks coming out strong and scoring first then the Stars controlling play before scoring themselves. It was a fairly low-event period until the final five minutes or so when things heated up a bit, perhaps as both teams shook off the holiday rust. Either way, shot metrics ended up very even across the board at 5-on-5: attempts were 16-15 and shots 10-9 in favor of the Stars, but the Blackhawks had the slight edge in expected goals with 51.69 percent.

The Blackhawks seemed to be the better team overall in the second and were especially strong in the first five minutes. They pushed hard in those opening minutes, dictating play and pouring on chances, so much that it’s honestly a bit surprising the Blackhawks didn’t score. Unfortunately, the Stars seemed to finally come awake after the power play, and while the Blackhawks still were arguably the better team, it was a more even period the rest of the time, including being tied at the end. The Blackhawks still finished with 58.62 percent of the shot attempts and 60.39 percent of the expected goals while holding the Stars to just three shots on goal at 5-on-5 in the second.

The third period was slightly more lopsided than the others in favor of the Stars — not to an absurd degree or anything, but the Stars did have the puck more, the better of the chances, and hit a couple of posts/bars. Dallas ended up with 13 scoring chances at 5-on-5, the first period either team hit double digits in that stat and more than double Chicago’s five chances — and even more when you add in special teams play. Now, the Blackhawks did an admirable job keeping shots against low — only six got through out of 15 of the Stars’ attempts — even if quality still skewed for the Stars. Soderblom was also big when needed. But this is where the admirability comes in: the Blackhawks didn’t allow themselves to wallow when the Stars took the lead, scoring quickly after to re-tie the game and push it to overtime. Considering the Blackhawks have folded a few too many times late in-game, it was really nice to see the never-give-up attitude that was so prevalent in the first couple of months again.

Here is MoneyPuck’s expected goals chart from the game, illustrating the edge the Stars held in that metric — though it’s worth noting the Blackhawks still did a good job keeping shot totals against low.

Overtime was another even affair: scoring chances were 4-1 for the Stars, but the Blackhawks kept shots even with two apiece and disrupted most of the truly dangerous plays. Where the Blackhawks lacked of possession in the third and overtime, they were good defensively to keep things from going off the rails and the shootout went in their favor. It wasn’t always pretty nor really dominant, but tonight’s game was still one of the more complete performances overall — and you really can’t ask for more from a team down it’s top two centers, including a generational player like Connor Bedard.

Vlasic said postgame the Blackhawks entered the game tonight with the goal to be hard to play against and they succeeded:

The Blackhawks were dealt an extremely tough hand today in terms of travel logistics, injuries and matchup.

They persevered through it all.

“We wanted to go to work and show them it wasn’t going to be an easy night.”

Postgame story from Dallas: https://t.co/dJrdgzHO8W

— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) December 28, 2025

Soderblom had an excellent night as well. As mentioned above, the team in front did a good job keeping things relatively even for a majority of the game, but there were moments when Dallas’ star players broke through — like on the few breakaways in the third, especially — and Soderblom was there with some very big stops. By no means was this a goalie win or anything, but he did end up saving 2.65 goals above expected, his second best performance of the season and exactly what the team needs from their netminders to give them a chance at the win — which the team in front took wholeheartedly. Extra credit to Soderblom and the penalty kill: considering the Stars had the second best power play in the league coming into tonight, it’s very impressive that the Blackhawks kept them off the board.

Arvid STOPS BENN on the breakaway pic.twitter.com/3XoeiBMeLq

— BHF (@BlackhawksFocus) December 28, 2025

Another huge stop by Arvid. Rantanen was all alone pic.twitter.com/0bDkoMKJBn

— BHF (@BlackhawksFocus) December 28, 2025

It was good to see Soderblom fare so well stopping the breakaways and also performing in the shootout — that was a trouble area for him in the past. He spoke postgame about how he’s been working on improving in this area, and it certainly worked for him tonight.

Arvid Soderblom said he’s been working on breakaways, and he stopped both Benn and Rantanen on breakaways in the 3rd period.

“[I want to] not back up too much, stay out there and challenge the shooters, take away net. I think I played a good game and that was a big part of it.”

— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) December 28, 2025

Coach Jeff Blashill largely stuck to four primary lines, one of his more consistent deployments of the season, and that stability seemed to translate to the on-ice performance. Shot generation at five-on-five was evenly distributed across the lineup: three players recorded three shots on goal, five had two, and seven finished with at least one. In the preview, I noted that the Blackhawks would need a true team effort to offset the absence of Connor Bedard, and that’s exactly what showed up here. No single player dominated the night, but Chicago played in a cohesive, balanced way, with contributions spread throughout the lineup—a formula that proved effective.

Blashill on these lines: “I was trying to keep some continuity from the last game. I don’t like moving lines around every game. We tried to keep the Donato line the same, and we just took Mikheyev out and put another guy in that skates pretty well in [Slaggert]… Him and Micky… https://t.co/UxzEfqNShe

— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) December 28, 2025

Ilya Mikheyev missed the game due to the birth of his child, prompting the Blackhawks to recall Landon Slaggert from Rockford and slot him alongside Jason Dickinson and Tyler Bertuzzi on what effectively became the top line. Slaggert made the most of the opportunity. In nearly 12 minutes of five-on-five ice time, he recorded two shot attempts — both on goal and scoring chances — and consistently won puck battles and recovered loose pucks. This version of Slaggert looked much closer to what we saw last season: not a primary offensive driver, but a high-effort, defensively reliable forward who can add value on a checking line.

Landon Slaggert is impressing early. Here he speeds in to create a shot pic.twitter.com/gbof1w6gnt

— BHF (@BlackhawksFocus) December 28, 2025

As a unit, the Dickinson line drew matchups against the Stars’ top two lines and largely held its own. Dallas gained a slight edge in the third period, but even then, Dickinson’s trio limited the Stars to just eight shot attempts and four shots on goal while accounting for two of the Blackhawks’ three goals. All things considered, that’s a strong night’s work.

The Blackhawks’ two middle lines drove play best in terms of shot possession. The trio of Nick Lardis, Sam Lafferty, and Dominic Toninato controlled the ice with a 68.18 percent share of shot attempts and a 72.25 percent share of expected goals in nearly eight minutes of five-on-five play, though that came against middling competition. Meanwhile, the line of Andre Burakovsky, Ryan Donato, and Teuvo Teräväinen also tilted the ice, posting a 63.16 percent share of attempts while breaking roughly even in expected goals (49.51 percent) against tougher matchups.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Oliver Moore, Ryan Green, and Colton Dach line struggled to generate possession. They were out-attempted 10–6, outshot 6–3, and finished with just 22.11 percent of the expected goals. That said, the line wasn’t without its moments. Each player rotated with other units at times and fared better in those looks, suggesting this was less an individual issue and more a case of a young line getting outworked by a more experienced Stars group.

Moore uses his speed to set up Toninato pic.twitter.com/BCqXYrRKDO

— BHF (@BlackhawksFocus) December 28, 2025

This was one of Vlasic’s best all-around games of the season. He was impactful offensively with several strong breakout passes and solid playmaking, while also doing good work defensively by shutting down neutral-zone plays, blocking shooting lanes, and generally being hard to play against. It’s been an up-and-down season for the young blueliner, but this was a strong night from him. He and Louis Crevier were good together once again.

The other defenseman who stood out was Artyom Levshunov. While there were still moments where he was overly aggressive or made some foundational mistakes, he also flashed the traits that make him a potential game-breaker. I’d still prefer to see him reunited with Wyatt Kaiser — who also had a nice game — but Levshunov and Grzelcyk worked well together when deployed in more sheltered, offense-leaning situations like they were tonight.

Great look for Levshunov pic.twitter.com/3Hnoi5Ms2K

— BHF (@BlackhawksFocus) December 28, 2025

Game Charts

Three Stars

Tyler Bertuzzi (CHI) — 2 goals

Alex Vlasic (CHI) — 2 assists

Arvid Soderblom (CHI) — .903 save percentage, 2.65 goals saved above expected

What’s Next

The Blackhawks play their second game in as many nights as they head home to host the Pittsburgh Penguins Sunday at 6 p.m.