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Come On, Come On: Sharks 4, Blackhawks 2

And just like that, Chicago’s lost three in a row again.

Posted on by Dave Melton
Credit: Bob Kupbens-Imagn Images

The Blackhawks lost to the worst team in the league on Thursday night, falling 4-2 on the road to the San Jose Sharks.

Will Smith started off a strong first period for the home side with this goal at the 3:48 mark of the opening 20 minutes:

Colin Graf added a second goal to give San Jose a 2-0 lead heading into the first intermission:

Chicago quickly cut that lead in half in the second period, with Frank Nazar scoring just 10 seconds in after being sent into the zone with an excellent cross-ice pass from Wyatt Kaiser:

Graf added his second during a San Jose power play in the middle of the second to restore the Sharks’ two-goal lead:

About three minutes later, Mikheyev pulled the Hawks back within one at the end of this quick counterattack:

Later in the second, Artyom Levshunov very nearly had this first career NHL goal when Georgiev briefly lost track of the puck and the rookie’s one-timer hit the post:

But Chicago would get no closer and Tyler Toffoli added an empty-netter to seal the deal. It’s extremely late, so let’s wrap this up.

Notes

Losing to the only team below them in the NHL standings is an incredibly disheartening way to spend a Thursday night but one aspect of this defeat that makes it a little easier to digest is that the best player on the ice — probably for both teams — was Frank Nazar. His line with Slaggert and Foligno was Chicago’s best in this game (88.89 shot attempt share and 98.51 expected goal share in 5:40 of 5-on-5 ice time together), which is probably why he took shifts in the third period with Bedard and Dach until the former was banished to the press box (more on that in a bit). Nazar does something to catch your eye in pretty much every game lately and it’s going to be an absolute blast to watch him put it all together over the next few seasons. Here’s hoping some more prospects follow that path.

Wyatt Kaiser’s performance can be applied here as well, as he picked up the primary assist on Nazar’s goal and was worthy of a second later in the game. The clip of Mikheyev’s goal above cut this part out so a longer version is below to show that the whole play started because Kaiser stood his ground at the opposing blue line and kept the play alive long enough for the puck to get to Teuvo, who moved the puck to Donato, who picked up the primary assist. This play doesn’t happen without his well-timed aggression.

We can be done with this Dach-Bedard-Dickinson line, right? Had a 50/50 split with zone starts but in the 4:25 that trio was on the ice together it did not have a shot attempt while allowing 10. Toss that idea in the nearest dumpster and set it on fire.

I have no hard evidence for this and it’s entirely possible that the assertion is incorrect, but: I feel like hockey players whine about officiating at a rate higher than that of any other professional sport. It feels like it’s part of the culture of the sport because it also feels like this trend trickles all the way down to the lowest level beer league. All of that is to say that I’m not really worried about Connor Bedard taking a 10-minute game misconduct in this game, even if it was an inopportune time. He’ll learn where the line is between making his voice heard with officials and saying something that results in a penalty. It’s also possible the ref overreacted to something more innocuous, given Bedard’s reaction to the whole thing:

Bedard remained mystified after the game, too:

Here’s a play from Levshunov that’ll endear him to certain segments of the fan base:

One critique of Levshunov that can be offered after this game: he’ll need to learn that he can’t skate away from everyone at the NHL level and sometimes he needs to move the puck instead of just moving his feet to get himself out of trouble. There were multiple instances in the third period when Levshunov tried breaking the puck out himself and he ended up flinging the puck up the boards aimlessly or turning it over altogether. Very much a tiny part of a much larger process, though.

In the first period, Chicago seemed to play a dump-and-chase game and San Jose out-attempted them 25-13, outshot them 10-5 and out-chanced them 14-6. In the final two periods, Chicago seemed more determined to carry the puck into the zone and enjoyed advantages of 32-20 in shot attempts, 17-11 in shots on goal and 16-7 in scoring chances. Some score effects can be factored in there but, surely, this San Jose team is such a menace at the blue line that the Hawks needed to concede possession every time they reached that spot on the ice, did they?

Spencer Knight: still fun!

There should be some way to receive free tickets to the Hawks game of your choice next season if you can verify that you watched this game in its entirety. The two worst teams in the league in mid-March for a 9:30 start locally? Should probably throw in a free beer, too.

Game Charts

Three Stars

  1. Collin Graf (SJ) — 2 goals
  2. Will Smith (SJ) — 1 goal, 1 assist
  3. Frank Nazar (CHI) — 1 goal

What’s Next

The Blackhawks head up to the Pacific Northwest to face the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday night at 9 p.m.

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