In a season full of games that can be loosely categorized as “dumb,” a new candidate for the dumbest of them all emerged on Thursday night in California with the Blackhawks losing 4-0 to the Anaheim Ducks.
The stupid started early with this fight between Ross Johnston and Jarred Tinordi. Not shown in this video: the 2-on-1 Bedard was leading that could’ve been Chicago’s best scoring chance of the night, nullified by this pointless scrap!
The first period ended scoreless. About three minutes into the second, Anaheim scored first when a Ducks’ faceoff win in the Chicago end of the ice led to a point shot from Gustav Lindstrom that Alex Killorn — who outmuscled Tinordi for the proper net-front presence — tipped under the arm of Arvid Soderblom and into the net:
Guess we know who Foligno will be battling in box-out drills at the next Chicago practice.
In the middle of the second, Brett Leason skated into the Chicago zone and sniped one past Soderblom, because it’s a game against the Hawks and Leason apparently has a contractual obligation to score in those games:
Anaheim added A Subtle Dagger with Killorn’s second of the period at the 18:26 mark of it:
The only other development from this game was an unfortunate one: this incidental knee-on-knee contact between Alex Vlasic and Leo Carlsson sent the latter to the locker room for the rest of the game:
Ryan Strome fought Vlasic early in the third, which definitely solved a lot of things.
Frank Vatrano added a fourth Anaheim goal during a two-man advantage in the third period for the final margin of victory. Let’s get to the notes so we never have to talk about this game again!
Notes
- Guess we don’t have to worry about Chicago catching Anaheim in the standings anymore, do we?
- No, this was not a good game from Soderblom. The third goal is one he probably has to stop. The second one is more of a challenge because of the screen by his one of his alleged teammates, but it’s definitely still one that a goalie with hopes of securing a long-term spot with the team probably needs to handle. He wasn’t Chicago’s biggest problem, though.
- There’s no point in spending too much time lamenting the obvious errors from Tinordi this evening because the league has spent the last decade explaining what he is by limiting him to just 109 games across seven NHL seasons before he arrived in Chicago, where he’s now up to 89 in the last two. It’s the decision to even have him in the lineup that is the issue here, which points to Luke Richardson. If the Hawks needed someone to fight, Nick Foligno and Jason Dickinson can do that. Hell, toss in Reese Johnson for the scratched MacKenzie Entwistle if that does it for ya. But there’s no special brand of “toughness” that Tinordi brings to the team which is so unique it calls for a roster shuffle as dramatic as going with 11 forwards and 7 defensemen. It’s just an outdated school of thought that no longer works with the way teams and lineups are constructed in the NHL these days.
- Wyatt Kaiser’s looked more like the October version of himself in the two games he’s played this week since returning from Rockford, and that’s very much a good thing. He and Zaitsev were given the cushiest zone starts but they posted the top two shot attempt shares on the team at 65.0 for Zaitsev and 62.5 for Kaiser.
- The Foligno-Bedard-Kurashev line had plenty of chances with a 67.33 expected goal share in the 13:31 it skated together but that was the only line worth writing about (we’ll call the 1:10 from Bedard-Donato-Raddysh too small of a sample for discussion). Really, that epitomizes the entire season: a line with Bedard on it can’t do it all and there’s just no worthwhile production from any of the other forwards to make up for it. Either Bedard flourishes or the whole team does not.
- From the start of the night, though, we should’ve known that the Hawks never had a chance in this one:
- Seriously: during a break in play from the first period, the PA inside the Honda Center was playing “Silhouette” by Thrice. The ensuing faceoff resulted in Killorn’s first goal. These things happen and there’s nothing we can do about it.
Game Charts
Three Stars
- Lukas Dostal (ANA) — 29 saves, shutout
- Alex Killorn (ANA) — 2 goals
- Brett Leason (ANA) — 1 goal, 1 assist
What’s Next
The Blackhawks cap off this trip to the west coast on Saturday night against the San Jose Sharks for a 9:30 p.m. puck drop.