The Chicago Blackhawks snapped their five-game losing streak in New York on Monday night, beating the Rangers 2-1, and giving interim head coach Anders Sorensen his first win in the NHL.
The Blackhawks have scored first in several games lately and tonight was no different. Tyler Bertuzzi finished a cross-ice feed from Taylor Hall with a snap shot from the circle to put the Blackhawks up 1-0 at 8:10 of the first period.
Just when it was looking like the Blackhawks would go into the second with a lead, the Rangers tied the game 1-1 with 43 seconds left in the first. While shorthanded, William Cuylle snapped home a rebound from the slot created by a Sam Carrick rush.
Taylor Hall gave the Blackhawks back their lead just over six minutes into the second. Hall finished off a beauty of a pass from Connor Bedard while on a 2-on-1 to make it 2-1. Credit to Jason Dickinson with the steal that sprung Bedard.
The Blackhawks were able to hold their lead throughout the third, finally winning 2-1 against the Rangers.
Notes
The Blackhawks had a slow start to this game, being out-attempted 25-15, outshot 12-7, and had only 35.67 percent of the expected goals at 5-on-5. It’s not that the Rangers were playing that much better, it’s that the Blackhawks still looked like they were trying to find their legs. Some miscues at both ends of the ice meant Chicago just didn’t have much zone time, and what zone time they had wasn’t particularly dangerous. Seriously: the Blackhawks generated only three scoring chances in that period.
The good news is that a hockey game is played for more than 20 minutes, because the second period was a complete opposite of the first in terms of effectiveness — almost literally — and they closed out the third in an impressive way. Shot attempts were 22-14, shots on goal were 12-6, and expected goals were 73.82 percent at 5-on-5 in favor of the Blackhawks in the second frame, and then the third period was pretty even up until the final six or seven, after which it was the Blackhawks who pushed the pace. It was the opposite of turtling in those last handful of minutes: they didn’t try to do anything too fancy or risky, the Blackhawks just kept the puck, cycled well, and didn’t collapse to try to suppress their way to a win. The Blackhawks finished the third with 66.67 percent of the shot attempts and 65.49 percent of the expected goals at 5-on-5. Even with the goalie pulled, the Rangers only managed a few good chances, and Arvid Soderblom stopped all of them.
Now, the Rangers are essentially in a freefall right now, so we shouldn’t get too overly excited. But some happiness is warranted. The Blackhawks haven’t always hung with other teams that are just as medicore as they’ve been, so having them do that tonight was encouraging.
Speaking of Soderblom, this was another very good game from the young Swedish netminder. The Blackhawks in front of him really supported him, but the Rangers have enough breakthrough talent that can score even when their team isn’t playing well, and Soderblom was big when needed throughout the game. The save below when he got a piece of Artemi Panarin’s shot (and a little help from the post) is an example:
With the way Soderblom has been playing this season, it’s good to see him rewarded with his second win of the season. And remember, he just turned 25 in August and goalie — outside of the progenies — tend to take longer to develop (see: Crawford, Corey). Not saying Soderblom is the Blackhawks goalie of the future, but it’d be better to keep him with the organization considering Drew Commesso has been inconsistent in Rockford and Adam Gajan has been struggling a little in the NCAA and still years away. Both the latter two have sub .900 save-percentages in their respective leagues.
Was Kevin Korchinski the best defenseman for the Blackhawks tonight? That might be a bit of a stretch, but he was really great in this game: strong in transition (especially breakouts), sharp passing, well-balanced between being aggressive and being patient, and more. Weirdly, the power play is the situation that gave him the most issues — he had no problem at 5-on-5 offensively with four attempts, two shots on goal, and a scoring chance in about 15 minutes — but he was a little iffy with his plays with the man advantage. Still, it was a nice comeback game for Korchinski, who was thrust in the NHL last season before he was really ready. Korchinski definitely deserves another game with the Blackhawks.
Korchinski wasn’t the only young defender that looked to be thriving a bit more with the type of system Sorensen is running: Alex Vlasic, Wyatt Kasier and Nolan Allan looked really comfortable jumping into plays and having more control with the puck. They weren’t perfect, obviously, but their defensive games were solid, too: strong positioning, good blue-line plays, disruption on passes, etc. For being the smallest of the trio, Kaiser is the one with a sneaky little mean streak, but the trio plays with a specific level of physicality that — at least in this game — hit perfectly. All three were also in the top-four in terms of TOI — Vlasic 23:28, Kaiser 20:52, and Allan 18:07 — which is just cool to see, even if it’s due to injuries to veterans that has them all playing so much.
Connor Murphy was the only player older than 23 in that top-four TOI; he played 22:10. The other veteran defenseman, TJ Brodie, played 14:43, so the least among the defenders. Even Korchinski edged him out at 5-on-5 by a little under a minute, but by a larger margin overall thanks to power-play time.
The blue line was the highlight of the game for me, with the forwards outside of Bertuzzi, Hall and Ryan Donato doing well but without being as eye-catching. And that Bertuzzi, Hall, Donato line really did dominate: attempts and expected goals favored the Blackhawks by at least double when they were on the ice. Hall is known for being a Rangers killer and looked absolutely the best he has as a Hawk. Bertuzzi had a strong offensive game in general — outside of a couple of turnovers and the bad penalty — but he looked much more effectively engaged. The key word there is “effective” because Bertuzzi has looked high effort in most games, but it’s not translated to consistent performance. Hopefully this could be the jumping off point for him.
Bedard had an OK game tonight, but the swagger that was there for a handful of games in the middle of this struggle just wasn’t there in MSG. He had the beauty pass on the Hall goal and a few others that linemates fumbled, but he finished with only one shot on goal in over 18 minutes. Bedard still has six points in his last seven games, so it’s not a drought by anymore, but he’s lacked a consistent spark. Bedard’s primary line had an interesting shot stat line too: Chicago had terrible quantity when the trio was on the ice (just 31.82 percent of the shot attempts) but better quality (51.72 percent of the expected goals). Not unexpected considering they were out against the Panarin line that fires a lot of shots, typically from mid-danger areas. Neither Ilya Mikeyev nor Philipp Kurashev stood out.
Jason Dickinson and Teuvo Teravainen seemed to really click this game: they combined for nine shot attempts, five on goal, and two scoring chances at 5-on-5. Nick Foligno did not gel as much with them, as he seemed behind the play at times, but he didn’t hurt them either. He’s been useful in other games and with other players more, though. Overall, they were the second best line of the night.
The Blackhawks had nine players play tonight who were members of the Rockford IceHogs at one point, seven of which are 25 or younger. Neat.
One final note, the slow start for the first period overall didn’t really change that the Blackhawks scored first for the 17th time in 28 games — that’s currently tied for first in the NHL with the Minnesota Wild and Buffalo Sabres. It’s crazy how terrible they’ve been at holding on to momentum.
Game Charts
Three Stars
- Taylor Hall (CHI) — 1 goal, 1 assist
- Arvid Soderblom (CHI) — .967 save-percentage on 30 shots
- Tyler Bertuzzi (CHI) — 1 goal
What’s Next
The Blackhawks stay in New York but head to Long Island to take on the Islanders on Thursday at 6:30 p.m.