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I’m a Believer: Blackhawks 6, Sharks 3

Back in the win column!

Posted on by L_B_R
Credit: Talia Sprague-Imagn Images

The Chicago Blackhawks snapped a five-game losing streak with a 6-3 win over the San Jose Sharks at the United Center on Monday.

The Blackhawks struck first on the power play seven minutes into the opening period. From the slot, Teuvo Teravainen found Connor Bedard, who ripped a sharp-angle one-timer from the bottom of the left faceoff circle to put the Blackhawks up 1-0.

Connor Murphy doubled the lead just over two minutes into the second period, firing a shot through traffic from the top of the right circle that slipped between Yaroslav Askarov’s pads.

Ryan Donato made it 3-0 at 9:35 in the second with a highlight-reel effort, pulling off a slick toe-drag to get around Vincent Desharnais before burying a shot while being knocked off balance. Credit to Ilya Mikheyev for the setup with a perfectly timed cross-ice pass.

Sam Rinzel extended the Blackhawks lead to 4-0 about a minute later. Mikheyev picked off the ring-around attempt by the Sharks, waited patiently for the trailer, and then hit a wide-open Rinzel in the high slot for the finish.

The Sharks finally got on the board at 12:05 of the second period. Macklin Celebrini fed Will Smith, who snapped a shot past Spencer Knight’s stick from the bottom of the left circle to make it 4-1.

The Blackhawks answered quickly: just 36 seconds later, Ilya Mikheyev redirected Jason Dickinson’s cross-ice pass for a tip-in goal, restoring the four-goal cushion at 5-1.

Celebrini struck again late in the period to cut into the deficit for the Sharks. With 4:49 remaining in the second, Tyler Toffoli sent a sharp pass from the point to Celebrini in the slot, where he settled the puck and beat Spencer Knight upstairs with an amazing shot to make it 5-2.

The Sharks pulled within two early in the third period. Philipp Kurashev drove into traffic in the slot before sliding the puck left to Shakir Mukhamadullin, who went top shelf to make it 5-3.

That was as close as the Sharks got, though, as Donato scored his second with 5:19 left in the game to restore the Blackhawks three-goal lead. Ilya Mikheyev found his own rebound and dished it to Donato for the goal to give the Blackhawks a 6-3 win.

Notes

The Blackhawks came out fairly strong to start this one, controlling the first period in a way that didn’t immediately jump off the stat sheet. It was a low-event frame — just 13 total attempts in 12:25 of 5-on-5 play and 20 attempts across all situations — but the game itself wasn’t passive, full of end-to-end action even if that action didn’t result in a high volume of shots. Still, the Blackhawks had the puck more often, dictated where play was happening, and created the better chances (59.14 percent share of the expected goals). The Blackhawks also finally, finally scored a power-play goal.

That control carried into the early minutes of the second period, when the Blackhawks were assertive in setting the tone and were rewarded with three goals by the midway point. However, things predictably got a little looser as the Sharks pushed back and spent more time applying pressure than they had earlier. Still, nothing tilted dramatically: at 5-on-5, San Jose held a narrow edge in attempts (13–12) and expected goals (57.87 percent), while shots were even at 8–8, keeping the game fairly balanced even as the flow opened up.

Obviously, down three goals heading into the third, the Sharks were going to press, though it took them a while to really get up to speed. There were a few short bursts over the first 10 minutes — including a sequence that resulted in a goal — but the Blackhawks did a solid job of keeping the most dangerous chances off the net. Of San Jose’s 17 5-on-5 attempts in the period, only two qualified as high-danger chances. The raw numbers from the final frame (70.83 percent of the attempts and 56.24 percent of the expected goals for the Sharks) make it look like San Jose ran away with play, but that’s mostly score effects. Once the Blackhawks made it 6-3, the Sharks shifted into full “throw everything at the net and hope” mode, spamming attempts in search of something — anything — and coming up empty.

Overall, it was a solid game from the Blackhawks, even if it wasn’t the cleanest performance. This was very much a game between two not-very-good teams, both leaning heavily on young, inexperienced players and all the chaos that tends to come with that. For the Blackhawks, a few individual mistakes made things more complicated than they probably needed to be, but Chicago did a good enough job limiting the Sharks’ chances for most of the night and capitalized on its own opportunities, so there’s not much more you can ask for in a win.

Coach Jeff Blashill rightfully summarized this game as “goofy”:

For tonight, I’m going to keep things mostly positive, because I think we could all stand to bask in this somewhat weird victory for a bit.

First, let’s hear it for the veterans. We’ve understandably spent most of the season hyper-focused on the progress, good and bad, of the young players, since they’re the future of the team. But obviously the most effective line on the ice tonight was clearly Donato, Mikheyev, and Jason Dickinson. It’s a combination we at SCH have been calling for over the past few weeks, largely because Bertuzzi on the checking line tends to limit what he does best, while Donato (and Teuvo Teravainen) have consistently found ways to generate offense even within a more defensive role.

This hasn’t been a great season overall for Donato, but this was an excellent night for him. He led the Blackhawks in 5-on-5 shot attempts (4) and was tied for the team lead in shots (2), scoring chances (3), and points (4). Mikheyev may have been even better, bringing a noticeable uptick in playmaking to his game on top of generating chances himself. He matched Donato with two shots, three chances, and four points at 5-on-5, finishing just one attempt behind him. Dickinson, meanwhile, posted goose eggs across the board in the shot metrics, but that hardly tells the story. He did all the subtle center things that make a line function — winning battles, being in the right spots defensively, and allowing the other two to play fast and free.

Let’s take a look at Donato’s goal again just because it’s so nice:

Another highlight was Connor Bedard’s goal, his third in as many games. It’s been noticeable that he didn’t look quite like himself immediately after returning from injury, but even then he was consistently putting himself in scoring areas and getting pucks on net — the process was there, even if the results lagged behind, and the goals always felt inevitable. Tonight, Bedard finished with four attempts, even if only one officially hit the net, but that one went in so that’s a win in my book. That’s also where Bedard’s shooting IQ really stands out: he doesn’t just shoot to shoot, he picks his spots, changes angles, and waits for goalies to commit before releasing. Even when the volume isn’t overwhelming, the quality is, and nights like this are a reminder that, as long as he’s creating looks from dangerous areas, the finishing will follow.

Bedard was mic’d up this game, so we’ll likely get more clips from him but here are a few handy now:

The fact that Bedard’s goal came on the power play was also nice to see, even if the rest of the man-advantage work was fairly meh. Alex Vlasic and Murphy joked post-game that the Blackhawks’ penalty kill helped boost their power play counterparts’ confidence by letting them score a few times in practice:

Rinzel also turned in one of his better performances of the season, taking full advantage of a game where he was given heavily offensive deployments and he showed off a bit while maintaining some poise. His start to his NHL season was admittedly rough, but the steady work he’s put in at the AHL level has clearly helped him iron out some of the early kinks. Rinzel’s projection has always been appealing because of how he thinks the game: he moves pucks quickly, reads pressure well, and is comfortable pushing play in transition rather than defaulting to safe outs. When the game opens up, those traits stand out even more, like they did tonight. That showed up in the numbers as well where, in all situations, Rinzel led the Blackhawks in shot attempts (6) and was tied for the team lead in shots (3). Again, he was given mostly sheltered, offensively-skewed deployment to soften his return, so these results should be viewed in that context, but it’s a definitive improvement from what we were seeing to start the season.

The negatives will be kept short and sweet, because they mostly come down to inexperience. As mentioned, these were two youth-heavy teams, and as the game wore on, the sloppiness started to show. It’s almost not surprising that the veteran lines were the most effective — the younger players were all pressing hard, feeding off each other’s energy from both teams, and it made for a messier style of play. Frank Nazar and Oliver Moore, for example, were flying around with high effort and high motors but without a clear sense of direction, resulting in limited impact despite the hustle.

Louis Crevier, meanwhile, had a quieter night. He’s not a rookie since he’s been with the Blackhawks on and off for three seasons, but this is the first campaign where he’s played in nearly every game, and that consistency is still new for him at the NHL level. His lack of top-end speed can be a hindrance, especially against fast players like the Sharks’ young guns, and he’s not the smoothest operator in transition. That showed up in a few more miscues than usual tonight.

Game Charts

Three Stars

  1. Ryan Donato (CHI) — 2 goals, 2 assist
  2. Ilya Mikheyev (CHI) — 1 goals, 3 assists
  3. Connor Murphy (CHI) — 1 goals, 2 assists

What’s Next

The Blackhawks are on the road for their final game before the Olympic break, heading to Columbus to take on the Blue Jackets Wednesday at 6 p.m.

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