NINE AND COUNTING

Nolan Baumgartner and Markus Naslund scored in the second period, and Jarkko Ruutu converted a penalty shot late in the third as the Vancouver Canucks defeated Chicago 3-2 on Thursday night to hand the Blackhawks their ninth straight loss.

Alex Auld made 26 saves for the Canucks, who snapped a three-game losing streak.

Tuomo Ruutu and Martin Lapointe scored for the Blackhawks, who last lost nine in a row from Feb. 17 to March 7, 2003.

Craig Anderson made his fourth straight start in goal for Chicago and blocked 14 shots, including a stop of Alexandre Burrows' penalty shot 34 seconds into the third period.

Nikolai Khabibulin, the Blackhawks' top goalie, remains on injured reserve with a groin pull and has not yet resumed skating.

Ruutu opened the scoring with 7:44 left in the first. After skating down left wing, he fired a rising wrist shot from the circle that beat Auld high on the glove side and landed in the upper right corner of the net.

Ruutu's goal was his first after missing 25 games with a back injury and first since the second game of the season.

Baumgartner tied it 1-all at 6:22 of the second with a short-handed goal. After Anderson stopped Henrik Sedin's shot from the high slot, Baumgartner went to the net, got free from Chicago defenseman Anton Babchuk and knocked in the rebound.

Naslund put Vancouver ahead, 2-1, 1:10 later.

After making saves on Todd Bertuzzi and Kevin Bieksa, Anderson appeared to lose sight of the loose puck. Naslund picked it up in the right circle and fired it in.

Burrows was awarded a penalty shot 34 seconds into the third after he was pulled down from behind by Babchuk on a breakaway. Anderson made a right pad save on Borrows' penalty-shot attempt.

Ruutu scored on his penalty shot, using a backhander to beat Anderson with 2:02 left. Ruutu was awarded the shot after being tripped from behind by Lapointe.

Lapointe cut it to 3-2 with 1:37 left.

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