Josh Norris had a goal and an assist, and Jake Sanderson and Drake Batherson each had two assists for the Senators (31-25-5), who had lost six of their previous seven games (1-5-1). Linus Ullmark made 17 saves.
“It’s huge,” Batherson said. “In the Eastern Conference right now it’s so tight. Every game matters for us, no matter who we play. We’ve got to come and try to get a win. Obviously last game (a 5-4 shootout loss at the Washington Capitals on Monday) we came close. Coming into tonight we really needed that one. Big goal there by Timmy.”
Ryan Donato, Teuvo Teravainen and Craig Smith scored for the Blackhawks (19-35-8), who had won two in a row. Soderblom made 22 saves.
“Yeah, I think we've been playing great the last three games,” Chicago forward Patrick Maroon said. “We should be proud of ourselves. But I think we talked among the group, like, going forward here, we want to be about .500 going into the end of the season here.
“So we want to battle as much as we can, and we want to play good hockey and build good habits and play the right way and learn how to play the right way for a long period of time, instead of just one game at a time. And then we have three bad ones. So the boys stuck with it tonight. They're (the Senators) a desperate hockey team, as you guys know, they're fighting for a (playoff) spot. So we got their best tonight. I thought we handled it pretty well.”
Brady Tkachuk made it 1-0 for the Senators at 2:25 of the first period, scoring with a tip of Artem Zub’s shot from the right point.
Donato tied it 1-1 at 11:38. After the puck came off the end boards on a dump-in, Ullmark pushed it to the right of the crease, where Landon Slaggert gathered it and fed Donato in front for a backhand. It was Donato’s 100th NHL goal.