That was a bad loss.
Sometimes the simplest answer is the most correct one, and that seems to apply to whatever the hell it was that transpired in Toronto on Tuesday night, as the Blackhawks turned a 2-0 lead into a 3-2 loss to a Maple Leafs team that seemed ready for an implosion at the end of 40 minutes.
It’s a bad loss, and the hours following it have found me in desparate attempts to avoid what’s probably my biggest pet peeve with sports media in 2025, which is how short-sighted so much of the analysis of these games can be and how violently that analysis can swing between the opposite ends of each argument.
The worst examples of this are the days between NFL games, because the nature of the sport’s schedule lends itself to a lot of weekday airtime that needs to be filled. Any social media search of “Caleb Williams” on a Monday morning should serve as a solid example of this, given how each Bears game seems to be a referendum on his entire career. Hockey is more immune from this scourge than other sports, partially due to its continued relative anonymity on the sports media landscape in the US as well as its 82-game regular season, with the constant presence of games on the calendar meaning there’s less time to waste on pointless discussions.
So, no, this is not the place that’s going to suggest that Tuesday’s defeat means the season is over and we’re back to chasing draft lottery odds. But this is the place that’s going to suggest that this team has been trending downward for about a month now and Tuesday’s loss is just the latest piece of evidence of that southward trajectory, with Connor Bedard’s injury last week being the snapping of a branch that was doing all it could to keep this team from plummeting down even faster. Since a 5-2 win over the Calgary Flames on Nov. 18, Chicago is just 3-9-2, which is pretty terrible. It was also 3-7-2 with Bedard in the lineup over that span, so his absence isn’t the sole reason things are bad all of the sudden — and we’re going to examine that more in a bit. Within that last month are three horrendous blowout losses, two of them coming in the same weekend in California. The Black Wednesday loss to the Wild and the Dec. 2 loss to Vegas both featured third-period leads that didn’t survive. Hell, the Nov. 20 loss to the Kraken also saw the Hawks enter the third period with a 2-0 lead and then lose the game 3-2 — and that one was at home!
So, yeah, Tuesday’s game was a bad loss. In a vacuum, it’s just that. But as you continue zooming out over the last month of games, there are more bad losses like that one to count than there are quality victories. And as those bad losses pile up while the team’s best player is on the shelf, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to see a way that this team is going to salvage a season that seems like it’s beginning to slip away from them completely. As LBR pointed out in Tuesday’s recap, there’s now a noticeable gap between where the Blackhawks are in the standings and where the playoff teams are.
The Week That Was
Wednesday, Dec. 10: Blackhawks 3, Rangers 0
Really thought things were returning to normalcy after this relatively easy win. Guess not!
Friday, Dec. 12: Blues 3, Blackhawks 2
Of course this is the team that injures Bedard. OF COURSE.
Saturday, Dec. 13: Red Wings 4, Blackhawks 0
It was almost impressive, how quickly it became apparent that the Hawks weren’t going to do much of anything in this game.
Tuesday, Dec. 16: Maple Leafs 3, Blackhawks 2
Still in disbelief!
Treading Paper
Had this thought following the Leafs loss that the heater Bedard was on during late October and virtually all of November, while certainly enjoyable from an individual perspective, was papering over the massive lack of depth scoring this Blackhawks roster still has — an issue that’s since moved to the forefront with Bedard now sidelined. Let’s use Nov. 19 — the day after a 5-2 win over the Flames and before the ugly loss to the Kraken — as the demarcation point between when things were better with the Hawks and when things turned sour and see if the other forwards who’re supposed to be scoring trended down around that time, perhaps to explain why things started heading south. We’ll start with the man himself.
Bedard before 11/19: 19 GP, 13 G, 16 A, 29 P
Bedard after 11/19: 12 GP, 6 G, 9 A, 15 P
Next we’ll go in order of the five forwards behind Bedard for the team lead in points. They are, in order: Tyler Bertuzzi, Andre Burakovsky, Frank Nazar, Teuvo and Ryan Donato.
Bertuzzi before 11/19: 16 GP, 9 G, 6 A, 15 P
Bertuzzi after 11/19: 14 GP, 7 G, 4 A, 11 P
Perhaps a mild step back for Bertuzzi but he’s still been producing at near the same rate he was earlier in the season. Burakovsky’s next, and he’s been Bedard’s top linemate this season.
Burakovsky before 11/19: 17 GP, 7 G, 8 A, 15 P
Burakovsky after 11/19: 11 GP, 1 G, 5 A, 6 P
From near a point per game to about half of a point per game. That’s something. Up next is Nazar and we all probably know what this will look like:
Nazar before 11/19: 17 GP, 5 G, 8 A, 13 P
Nazar after 11/19: 14 GP, 0 G, 7 A, 7 P
The lack of goals from him remains a concern and it’s going to be sweet, sweet relief when he finally gets one. Teuvo time:
Teuvo before 11/19: 19 GP, 4 G, 9 A, 13 P
Teuvo after 11/19: 13 GP, 2 G, 2 A, 4 P
A noticeable decline here, although we’re going to offer a small measure of grace because a) it’s Teuvo, shut up and b) he did put his face on front of a puck against LA to help secure one of the rare victories of the last month. We’ll end with Donato, who was the team’s leading goal scorer last season and second to Bedard in points.
Donato before 11/19: 19 GP, 7 G, 5 A, 12 P
Donato after 11/19: 19 GP, 1 G, 0 A, 1 P
Ouch.
So, yeah, it seems like the Blackhawks offensive production outside of Bedard started drying up right around the time that Chicago stopped winning as consistently as it was earlier in the season. This is almost certainly not a coincidence. Getting Bedard back from injury is obviously the quickest path towards getting this season turned back around. But if the Hawks are going to fully return to the winning ways of the first quarter of the season, some forwards other than No. 98 need to start consistently producing as well.
The Week That Will Be
Thursday, Dec. 18: Blackhawks at Canadiens
Already terrified at the thought of what Ivan Demidov is going to do in this game, just to make us all feel a little bit worse.
Saturday, Dec. 20: Blackhawks at Senators
Every time I see the Senators on the schedule, it feels like it requires a more extensive look into what they’ve been up to during the season because they just seem like such an irrelevant hockey franchise lately.
Tuesday, Dec. 23: Blackhawks vs. Flyers
Becoming increasingly frustrated that the Hawks didn’t do more in pursuit of Trevor Zegras when he was available in Anaheim.