Chicago Blackhawks forward Pat Maroon started Sunday’s matinee against the Philadelphia Flyers with a nice retirement gift: a highlight-reel-worthy goal.
The Hawks were down 1-0 on Jamie Drysdale’s game-opener.
Maroon disrupted a Philly breakout as several Flyers were already headed out of the zone. That left Ilya Mikheyev free to collect the puck and pass it to Nick Foligno, who sent it back to Maroon for the tying tip-in.
Maroon looked more like he was breathing a sigh of relief than anything resembling a celebration, as smiling teammates mobbed him.
Maroon announced his retirement Saturday during the intermission of a road game against his hometown St. Louis Blues, where he spent the 2018-19 season.
“I’ve given everything I have,” Maroon said after that game. “I wanted to go out on my own terms. I don’t want to be scratching and crawling for a contract and them telling me I’m out.”
Joe Veleno, who initially joined Maroon on the fourth line after his trade from Detroit, joined him on the scoresheet with a wrister 47 seconds later.
Their moment in the sun didn’t last a minute.
Travis Sanheim tied it 2-2 just 12 seconds after Veleno’s goal (and 59 seconds after Maroon’s).
That was just the appetizer for the fireworks to come in a game that culminated in a Hawks’ 7-4 win, snapping a seven-game losing streak.
Bobby Brink regained the lead for the Flyers, but Connor Bedard tied it with an unassisted goal — his 20th of the season.
In the second, Tyler Bertuzzi’s goal and Ryan Donato’s power-play tip-in staked the Hawks to a 5-3 lead, but Travis Konecny cut into it with a sneaky point shot.
Donato followed up with a doorstep one-timer from Teuvo Teräväinen.
In his eight-year career, Donato had never had two power-play goals in a game, let alone in a period.
Lukas Reichel led off the third with his seventh goal of the season and first since March 1 in Anaheim.
Playing a lot of fourth-line minutes (sensing a theme here), Reichel doesn’t get many opportunities that the goalie doesn’t see coming.
That was the case against Ivan Fedotov, but Reichel waited for the Flyers goalie to make his move, maneuvered around his pad and banked his shot off Emil Andrae’s skate.
His goal gave the Hawks a 7-4 lead, the first time they put up seven goals since March 12, 2024, against the Ducks.
