There’s been plenty of talk this Blackhawks season — especially on some of the home broadcasts — regarding the shutdown defensive pairing of Alex Vlasic and Louis Crevier, who’ve been tasked with some of the most difficult assignments among Chicago blue-liners this season.
The “shutdown” label describes their task, but are they truly shutting down their opponents? Let’s see what the numbers can tell us, using Natural Stat Trick’s always excellent data.
Vlasic, who’s 24 and was a 2019 second-round pick (No. 43 overall) and Crevier, who’s also 24 and was a 2020 seventh-round pick (No. 188 overall), have racked up the most 5-on-5 ice time of any Blackhawks D pairing this season at 514:28. Together, they’re underwater in just about every category, which can be expected of a duo that’s started in the offensive zone just 37.74 percent of the time. The Hawks’ possession numbers look like this when Vlasic and Crevier have been on the ice at 5-on-5:
- 49.01% of shot attempts (469 for, 488 against)
- 47.26% of shots on goal (207 for, 231 against)
- 47.71% of scoring chances (219 for, 240 against)
- 42.55% of high-danger chances (80 for, 108 against)
- 44.81% of expected goals (19.55 for, 24.07 against)
- 39.13% of goals scored (18 for, 28 against)
It’d be ideal if those numbers were all above the 50/50 split but that is a tall task given the assignments, and can be forgiven. We’ll follow the same order of stats and see how those numbers shake out when applied relatively to the team’s collective 5-on-5 numbers:
- shot attempt share is 2.86% above the team rate
- shot share is 2.10% above the team rate
- scoring chance share is 3.47% above the team rate
- high-danger chance share is 0.25% above the team rate
- expected goal share is 0.31% above the team rate
- goal share is 6.82% below the team rate
That’s … not bad? To have the Hawks with slightly better possession numbers collectively when the duo logging some of the hardest minutes is a decent result overall. The goal-scoring being in favor of the opponent can be chalked up to the defense-oriented zone starts.
So, overall, the numbers of the Crevier-Vlasic pairing seem fine. For comparison’s sake, how do those numbers stack up against some other D pairings who’ve had similarly difficult minutes?
We’ll keep the comparable D pairing’s identity quiet for a minute. Let’s get into the numbers first, with Vlasic/Crevier on the left and our comparable duo on the right, the latter of which has skated 219:47 of 5-on-5 ice time together this season. Yes, that’s about 300 minutes fewer than the former but still a good enough sample for comparison. It’s started in the offensive zone just 38.14 percent of the time, only a fraction more than Vlasic and Crevier’s 37.74. Let’s take a look at the numbers:
| For | Against | % | Stat | % | For | Against |
| 469 | 488 | 49.01 | CF% | 52.00 | 169 | 156 |
| 207 | 231 | 47.26 | SF% | 49.68 | 78 | 79 |
| 219 | 240 | 47.71 | SCF% | 49.64 | 69 | 70 |
| 80 | 108 | 42.55 | HDCF% | 49.15 | 29 | 30 |
| 19.55 | 24.07 | 44.81 | xGF% | 49.15 | 6.48 | 6.7 |
| 18 | 28 | 39.13 | GF% | 46.67 | 7 | 8 |
So the duo on the right is better in pretty much every category, aren’t they?
Well, that’s not so great, because that duo consists of Wyatt Kaiser and Connor Murphy, which would suggest that Vlasic and Crevier aren’t even the best shutdown pairing on their own team.
Let’s look at some more numbers, focusing on the rates of shot attempts, shots on goal and more that were generated by opponents when these respective duos are on the ice.
| Vlasic/Crevier | Stat | Kaiser/Murphy |
| 56.91 | CA/60 | 42.59 |
| 26.94 | SA/60 | 21.57 |
| 27.99 | SCA/60 | 19.11 |
| 12.6 | HDCA/60 | 8.19 |
| 2.81 | xGA/60 | 1.83 |
| 3.27 | GA/60 | 2.18 |
So, yeah, Kaiser and Murphy do a significantly better job at suppressing shots and chances against, ultimately resulting in fewer goals against when they’re on the ice despite largely similar assignments. There’s not a substantial difference in save percentage, either, with Chicago goalies at .879 when Vlasic and Crevier are on the ice and at .899 with Kaiser and Murphy out there (and if you wanted to argue that the slightly higher save percentage is a result of better play from the D pairing on the ice, you might be able to do so!)
This not to immediately dismiss the NHL futures of either Vlasic or Crevier, of course. Vlasic is signed through 2030 and has enough on his résumé to suggest there’s a spot for him on this team down the road — and likely an important one. Crevier remains more of a question mark, as he’s played about half (54) of the 110 games in his NHL career this season and it’s still unclear where his ultimate NHL ceiling resides. With both players turning 25 later this year, though, it’s hard to imagine either taking too significant of a leap from this point, and only one of this duo has proven worthy of top-four minutes before.
We don’t know who’s going to be the shutdown D pairing of this Hawks team when it (hopefully!) becomes worthy of Cup contention again. But it’s extremely difficult to imagine that Vlasic and Crevier will be the duo handling that task when said time arrives, considering they’re not the D pairing worthy of the “shutdown” label on their own team.