We’re not going to have a high quantity of Blackhawks wins this season, if the first week was any indication.
And that’s not a big problem, really. Development of the youth here can — and must! — occur alongside another season down in the bottom of the standings, because growing pains in the NHL can be especially unpleasant ones to endure. We had a brief discussion towards the end of our season preview podcast regarding whether or not a team with this many important kids on it could end up in the league basement again and not have it be a sign of larger problems for the rebuild, that those kids had to play well enough to see this team — at minimum — escape from last place. That thought still holds, although it does not venture into any sort of delusions about what this team will be: it’s heading back to the draft lottery again come 2026, and probably with some decent odds at the No. 1 pick once again.
But there should be some quality somewhere in the relatively low number of wins that the Blackhawks rack up this season which should inspire a little more confidence going forward. It feels like, for the last seven (eight?!) seasons, the only the time that the Blackhawks would win a game is if their goalie played out of their mind and/or a glutton of goals from special teams put Chicago ahead on the scoreboard for good. There should be some nights where that changes this season, and potentially in games that, should they happen in the last month or two of the regular season, get slapped with the “playoff-like atmosphere” moniker. Chicago’s first three games had that feel to them because each one was a home opener and the home crowds — two on the road, one at the UC — brought a little extra energy with them into the building.
Those games are going to resurface again at some point this season, providing moments of heightened intensity during other portions of the 82-game slog of a regular season that will have its arduous moments. I probably don’t need to go too far into the detail of these kinds of games because the likely veteran hockey fans who frequent this site don’t need to be told what those games feel like in the moment. What we’re hoping for here, though, is that this youthful Blackhawks side can find its collective legs in those moments to counter the uppercuts thrown by opponents with equally vicious attacks of their own. We’re not talking about a game where the Blackhawks are outshot 40-20 and outchanced 30-15 but still win because they score on a one-off breakaway amidst a flurry of scoring opportunities at their own end of the ice. No, this is about a game where the Blackhawks have their own sustained periods of possession in the offensive zone, generating the chances and shots that ultimately result in the game-winning goal they’ve been flirting with for dozens of shifts. This is about a game where the Blackhawks don’t just survive until the end, they dictate the terms of the play on the ice to their opponents and control the play in a way we just haven’t seen out of this team in years.
It probably won’t happen a ton of times this season, but chalk up a handful of those wins over some quality opponents throughout this season and it’ll start feeling like this team is going somewhere positive. Having the possibility of those games arriving on just about any given one of the 78 remaining on the schedule makes for a little more interesting viewing than we’ve had here in quite some time.
The Week That Was
Tuesday, Oct. 7: Panthers 3, Blackhawks 2
At times, it seemed like the Panthers had 10 guys on the ice because there was never a Chicago player with the puck on his stick for more than a fraction of a second before an opposing Panther was on him. Again: that’s why they’re the champs.
Thursday, Oct. 9: Bruins 4, Blackhawks 3
At some point during this game all the Boston vitriol that had been sitting dormant since about 2013 came surging back to life. Those would’ve been two extremely satisfying points.
Saturday, Oct. 11: Canadiens 3, Blackhawks 2
Was caught off guard by the feistiness of this game.
Monday, Oct. 13: Blackhawks 3, Mammoth 1
s/t to vaunted SCH commenter Raise to the Rafters #28 who pointed out in our comment section from this game that the last time the Bears and Blackhawks had both played on a Monday night was Nov. 24, 2014. Bears lost 17-13 to the Packers, Hawks won 3-2 over the Canucks.
This year’s double feature was much more fun.
Distant Suns
We probably shouldn’t venture too far down this road or LBR will start screaming at me about inadequate sample sizes, but the temptation is strong enough that we’ll take a quick peak at some more in-depth numbers after the first four games of the season because this entire season will require closer analysis to separate what’s happening on a team that will likely be bad collectively from the individual bright spots along the way.
As the 5-on-5 ice time leader for the Blackhawks this season at 67:40, Wyatt Kaiser has a team-best shot attempt share of 52.83 percent. That’s significant because the best shot attempt share on the team last season was Ethan Del Mastro at 47.52 percent. Also, Kaiser’s expected goal share is 16.54 percent over the team rate, which is an easy way of saying that the Blackhawks have been better with Kaiser on the ice. Also, Kaiser has been on the ice for two goals scored at 5-on-5 and zero allowed. We’ll take all of that, please and thank you.
Artyom Levshunov has been sheltered with his zone starts (team-high 65.22 percent in the offensive zone) but has largely helped turn those advantageous moments into scoring chances, most noticeably his well-timed pinch against Utah on Monday night that led to an Ilya Mikheyev goal. His expected goal share is 55.75 percent, which is the best mark among Blackhawks blue-liners and virtually all of his possession stats are over the 50/50 mark. He plays an extremely chaotic style and will drive us all insane at times but there are small glimmers of hope amidst that everything ongoing with him.
Jason Dickinson has started in the offensive zone just 15.38 percent of the time but has been flipping the ice to the tune of a 69.13 expected goal share. His contract is up at the end of this season and he turned 30 in July but … seems like a guy who plays a defense-first role can maintain a quality level of play into his 30s if he’s playing under 15 minutes each night, right?
OK, OK, we can stop now. Just a little sample before we get off the rails here. This is all probably just a symptom of spending the last several years checking the data over at Natural Stat Trick and being painfully underwhelmed by how bad the Blackhawks numbers always looked there.
The Week That Will Be
Wednesday, Oct. 15: at St. Louis Blues
Win this one, please.
Friday, Oct. 17: vs. Vancouver Canucks
I was very uncomfortable in learning about Marco Sturm being the Boston head coach because I quite vividly remember him as a player so seeing that Adam Foote is the coach here is equally disturbing.
Sunday, Oct. 19: vs. Anaheim Ducks
Don’t care who their coach is or who else is on their roster: any team with Radko Gudas as a captain cannot be good. See also: Trouba, Jacob.