The Blackhawks put together another late rally that ultimately fall short, losing 4-3 on the road to the Minnesota Wild on Monday night.
As is pretty typical this season, the Blackhawks scored first thanks to a sneaky five-hole goal by Connor Bedard just under seven minutes into the first. He picked off a turnover as the Wild tried to exit to start the play.
The Wild tied the game 1-1 at 11:11 of the first. After a lot of cycling, Marco Rossi deflected Mats Zuccarello’s shot that hit the post and trickled behind Arvid Soderblom, allowing Kirill Kaprizov to pounce on the puck to knock it home.
Nick Foligno gave the Blackhawks a 2-1 lead at 6:16 of the second period when he got the puck to Frank Nazar on a 3-on-1, then shoveled in Nazar’s rebound.
The elation was short-lived as Jared Spurgeon retied the game 2-2 just 49 seconds later, shoveling in a backhanded shot stick side while Soderblom was screened.
The Wild took their first lead of the game under three minutes into the third period. Jonas Brodin fed Brock Faber in the high slot, who one-timed the puck it into the back of the net, giving the Wild the 3-2 lead.
Marcus Foligno scored an empty-net goal with 1:24 left in the game to make it 4-2 Wild.
The Blackhawks made this a little interesting by scoring a goal with 33 seconds left, though they weren’t able to complete the comeback. Lukas Reichel found Jason Dickinson with a little cross-crease pass and the latter slapped the puck in.
Notes
The first period was pretty even in terms of possession until the Wild took over in the final handful of minutes, but the Wild did a better job at generating and suppressing quality the whole period. Shots ended up close at 12-11, but the Blackhawks were out-attempted 24-15, out-chanced 12-6 and had just 29.76 percent of the expected goals. Those numbers seem worse than it felt, but Soderblom did have to make some big saves, especially late, to keep the game tied.
The second period was a little more up-and-down for the Blackhawks: they scored after a mini-push, then the Wild scored after their own small push, and it kind of felt like it might continue that way with how loose the two teams were playing. The Blackhawks finished with 50 percent of the shot attempts, 55.56 percent of the shots on goal, and 54.75 percent of the expected goals. The main issue with this period was the Blackhawks being pushed off the puck a little too easily, especially some of the defenders, and of course allowing such a quick goal against right after scoring themselves. Bad habits are hard to shake, apparently.
The Blackhawks weren’t as aggressive to start the third as you would expect considering how they’ve been playing lately, which led directly to the third goal against. They didn’t really start to mount a comeback until the final six or so minutes of the period, and while they did finish with the better chance numbers — 8-4 scoring chances and 6-3 high danger chances — a miscue with the goalie pulled ended their chances of pushing the game to overtime.
Ultimately, I didn’t mind this loss too much: it wasn’t the Blackhawks cleanest effort and the start to the third was a little more lackluster than I liked, but they felt competitive the rest of the game, played hard at the end, and were basically even with the Wild. Well, except for when the Wild’s top line was on the ice, which makes sense considering Kaprizov is a Hart Trophy candidate this season and Rossi and Boldy are excellent young players developing into stars on their own. Bedard is really the only forward on the Blackhawks of similar quality.
The Blackhawks were oh-so close to tying the game a few times in the third, but no chance closer than this missed Teravainen shot. It’s disappointing of course to lose, but it’s hard to be too angry about it overall.
Soderblom lost track of the puck on that Kaprizov goal, but I’m more annoyed at why there wasn’t a single Blackhawk paying attention Kaprizov — you know, the best player on the ice. Seth Jones and Nolan Allan are both trying to cover Marco Rossi and Teuvo Teravainen is facing the initially shooter, and everyone seems to miss Kaprizov cycling all the way around and then through the middle to get inside position in the slot. Declan Chisholm is also wide open on the left too.
The issue with the defenders not clearing the crease continued in this game and contributed somewhat to the first three goals as can be seen in the screenshot above as well as on the Wild’s second and third goals shown below.
Jones was the defender who failed to clear in two of the three goals, and actually contributed to blocking Soderblom’s view on the third goal against. He looked rusty but not terrible last game, but he had a few more issues tonight. In addition to the lack of crease control, Jones was on the wrong side of coverage a handful of time, didn’t have much success defending the blue line, and misplayed the puck a few times.
It’s not like Jones was alone in mistakes tonight, though his were the most noticeable and consistent. Brodie was having issue with gap control most of the night, although he got better as the game went on and he had some neat zone denials. Allan struggled a bit with puck handling and passing resulting in a few turnovers. Puck handling was at one time his weakest area, and while he’s improved tremendously over the last two years, he’s bound to have some rookie mistakes. Vlasic was mostly quiet, though he pinched at the wrong moment on the overturned goal against, and Murphy seemed a bit behind at times, slower than he has been lately. As for Korchinski, he did get knocked around a bit too much and caught flat-footed occasionally, but he also was smart with his stick, was fairly active in the offensive zone, and had the great clear that kicked off the Foligno goal. Mixed bag overall but not terrible by any means.
Hall had two assists tonight to bring his total to eight points (2G, 6 A) in the nine games since the coaching swap, with all but one point being primary. He’s also been involved in every goal that is scored by the Blackhawks when he’s on the ice in the same span — only Teravainen has contributed as much directly.
The Bedard goal was a neat little work of deception that we haven’t seen much from him this season, but it’s an example of how tricky can be. He also was pretty feisty in this game, getting into it with Rossi more than a few times.
After a few just so-so games, Nazar looked his best since being called up tonight. In addition to his assist on Foligno’s goal, he had a few other really dangerous chances — like the one below — and he finished with five shot attempts and four scoring chances. His line with Foligno and Donato was the best of the night: with that trio on the ice, the shots attempts and shots on goal favored the Blackhawks 16-9 and 10-4, respectively, and the team owned 66.75 percent of the expected goals. He was rewarded with over 16 minutes of playing time that were well-deserved.
Individually, Nazar’s stats are even better:
The pass by Reichel at the end was pretty nifty, and it kind of makes me want to see what he would do on a line with someone like Jason Dickinson. The only issue, of course, is that Dickinson’s line tends to face high quality of competition in a checking role, but it’d be great if Reichel had a bit more support on his line offensively. The kind of father-son relationship between between Pat Maroon and Reichel is adorable, but at some point the latter either needs to be tried in the top-nine more consistently or they find another linemate who isn’t Joey Anderson.
Game Charts
Three Stars
- Brock Faber (MIN) — 1 goal
- Taylor Hall (CHI) — 2 assists
- Connor Bedard (CHI) — 1 goal
What’s Next
The Blackhawks are off for the holiday break until Friday when the Buffalo Sabres will host them at 6 p.m.