Blackhawks Patchwork Blue Line Beats Blue Jackets
Tuesday night was supposed to be another reunion. But Seth Jones did not return to Columbus; instead, he was placed in COVID protocol before the game, where he joined Jake McCabe.
So the Blackhawks had to find a couple young defensemen to fill their spots against a Blue Jackets team that was celebrating Adam Boqvist’s 100th career regular season game.
Because of course.
Wearing No. 76 in white was Jakub Galvas, making his NHL debut. Ian Mitchell also got into the lineup for Chicago, but it was Galvas who was impressive early and got on the ice often. Galvas was on the ice with the first unit of Chicago’s power play when they got an opportunity in the first period. Not bad, kid.
By the time the Blackhawks got their first advantage of the opening period the score was already tied at one. Boone Jenner scored at 12:51 to give Columbus a 1-0 lead but the Hawks fired back quickly. Alex DeBrincat received a nice pass from Riley Stillman and tied the game just 24 seconds later.
At the end of the first period, each team had eight shots on net and both teams had one goal on the board. The Blackhawks had roughly half of a power play carrying over to start the second, however.
The advantage that started the second period was ugly, unfortunately. And then the Blackhawks took a couple penalties, slowing their momentum and giving a mediocre Columbus power play the opportunity to grab the lead.
They did not.
And the Blackhawks were able to grab the lead at 15:10 when Calvin de Haan found the back of the net.
Philipp Kurashev and MacKenzie Entwistle picked up the assists on de Haan’s first of the year.
The official scorer had the shots at 8-3 in favor of the Blue Jackets in the second period but one of those three Chicago shots was the difference maker.
Chicago had a much better start to the third than they did in the second and were able to get the all-important next goal to build their lead to two. A pressing passing sequence ended with Connor Murphy ripping a shot home for his third of the season — and Chicago’s third of the night.
Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane picked up the helpers on Murphy’s goal.
With 2:58 left in regulation, Emil Bemstrom boarded Riley Stillman in the corner (dangerously) and went to the box, giving the Blackhawks a power play with a two-goal lead for almost the rest of regulation if they didn’t score.
So of course the Blackhawks give up a short-handed goal.
An awful turnover found Gustav Nyqvist who took off the other direction and beat Marc-André Fleury with 15 seconds left on the Hawks’ “advantage.” Now it was a one-goal game with 81 seconds left in regulation.
A soft clearing attempt popped up in the neutral zone but DeBrincat was shot out of a cannon (maybe after Columbus’ goal?). He beat all of the Jackets to the puck, rifled a shot at the empty cage that was wide but he was able to tap in his own rebounds for his second goal of the night and Chicago’s fourth of the night.
Final score: 4-2 Blackhawks, and a road trip that started with a steaming pile of crap effort in Arizona ends with wins in Vegas and Columbus.
Fleury has been terrific over his past two games. He stopped 24 of 26 in Tuesday night’s victory.
Galvas was really good. He finished second among Blackhawks’ defensemen in ice time (23:41) and was credited with one shot on net and two blocks. He spent 6:53 on the power play and 1:51 on the penalty kill in his debut.
Chicago’s defensemen combined for 13 blocked shots in the game; five of the six blueliners had multiple blocks with Stillman failing to register a one somehow in 22:26.
Dylan Strome won eight of 12 faceoffs to lead the Blackhawks. Jonathan Toews won seven of 13 while Ryan Carpenter (four of five) and Kirby Dach (four of six) were also above .500 for the night.
Galvas pretty impressive, made the most of his opportunity. Interesting Galvas, Mitchell and Beaudin all called up and not a sign of Kalynuk.
Good opportunity to extend win streak to 3 games Thirsday against Habs.
Put me in the Galvas fan club.
Too bad Entwhistle got robbed on that shot it into 1st period. Glad they didn’t fall apart.
And Columbus can take that frickin’ cannon and stick it where the sun doesn’t shine.
If the play by play announcer from tonight gets the job full time, that would be just fine. He is pleasant to listen to and flows with the game. He did miscall a couple numbers. Who doesn’t? Weideman should still get it and this guy (Chris) could do radio.
The Hawks did not get enough SOGs. They need to do better. The defense was pretty good.
Entwistle did not get nearly enough credit for the area play he made which Kurashev chased down. Granted, Kurashev deserved a lot of praise for superb hustle and speed and it was a nice goal. Excellent snipe from deHaan. Entwistle seems to look better each game and has been looking good since he got back. Kirby came up with some loose pucks too. Dach didn’t fall down once, did he? Next thing you know, he’ll score a goal. What is going on with Strome and face-offs? Where has this been his entire career? We can’t forget, he has had good spells before and then reverted to normal. Excellent finish by Murphy on his goal. Looked like the Cat standing at the circle and sniping. The Stillman pass to DeBrincat for his non-asterisk goal was beautiful as well.
Some fun plays in tonight’s game. The PP was not good. Kane is holding the puck again.
Galvas played well. We have seen lots of players play well in their first game only to decline. He did look poised. First PP unit? Not sure about that.
Ian made a good point. No Kalynuk and they needed defensemen. Doghouse?
As for Rfd. developing young players, we’ve seen last couple of years come up Lankinen, Soderblom and Delia in goal, with Galvas, Mitchell, Kalynuk, Beaudin, Regula and Philips on the blueline. Forwards Hagel, Entwistle, Kurashev, Slavin, R. Johnson, with Reichel just a matter of time, Hardman went down to get his game to needed level and good chance couple of more will see time in Nhl yet. Pretty impressive amount of depth coming from there right now.
It’s unfortunate that Jones couldn’t play in his “homecoming” game, but the rest of the blue line did a nice job against a not great team.
Strome is earning his minutes, more of this please.
Borgstrrom is not. Would not mind seeing Reichel replace him in the lineup. Borgs looks like he could use a night off.
it was a nice win against a bad team. Which team shows up Thursday, the one we saw the last couple of games or the one that shat the bed coming back from the Covid/Xmas break?
Free Reichel! Maybe a homecoming game against a bad Montreal team (assuming it doesn’t get postponed) may be a nice game to see him in the NHL? GIve the kid a taste and let him feel what the pace of the NHL is all about. He has nothing left to learn in the AHL. Reichel!
Should be interesting in the near future. Besides the 6 defensemen Ian named, add C. Jones and Stillman. You have Seth, McCabe, and Murphy for next year. So you have 8 defensemen for 3-4 slots. How does that sort out?
Solid defensively responsible game against an admittedly poor team. Good backchecking and skating most of the night. This has to be Kane,s longest goal drought in his career. He is not even getting a sniff at lighting the lamp. I would assume that Thursday nights game will be canceled given its a Canada team. They have some insane quarantine rules when returning from the United States. Just bubble the Canada teams if you want to complete the season. All their home games could be at the closest arena to the border.
Who looked like the better all around D man tonight – Boquist in his 100th NHL game or Galvas in his first? – I say Galvas – he’s a terrific skater forwards and back a good passer very poised and knows how to leverage his body even though he’s not big
Makes losing Boquist in Jones trade easier
Cole Sillinger looked like an 18 year old tonight. – might want to slow down the hype on him – he may end up being a very good player but he didn’t show it tonight
Strome has been very good the last 2 games especially but his FOs were good by the end of last year so his current production there is no fluke
If he keeps playing with this degree of competitiveness I may be back on the Strome train – he was very effective
Toews with sweet pass to
Murphy and awesome play by Kurashev to DeHaan
Looking forward to Hagel replacing Borg on Kane’s line
That’s 2 good efforts in a row
Kane has had just a couple classic bursts of energy in 2022, whatever is nagging him must be more of a problem of late; not really making him great trade bait for those thinking he’d draw a big return
I’d just been wondering when we were gonna see Chris Vosters on play-by-play in the announcing carousel – he stood out in early games and then disappeared a long time – agree with ROBS
Galvas looked poised & solid.
@Jacob Galvas…my assessment of him when I saw him play was that he was short, scrawny, sort of a jockey instead of hockey. I did say that he had excellent puck skills and was a very good skater. But, he did not play exceptionally well like he did last night. So, that tells me that playing these talented guys from Rockford with the best players will bring out their true talent. Mitchell played well for the 9+ minutes that the Clown King gave him. Why only 9 minutes? This guy…Milbury is spot on!
Put me down for getting on the Chris Vosters bandwagon although he’s a pretty accomplished play by play guy and has quite a resume, that’s probably not what the Organization is looking for. Cohen wasn’t forced to fill air time and almost sounded ok. The game?? Team win tonight!! pretty goal setup for Murphy. Has anybody seen Eddie O lately??
good effort not great not bad but good.
Toews reminds me of Doug Gilmour(later career) with the hawks; beaten, slowed, leader, and will be traded for a bottom 6 forward
just cant help, but the next 5-7 years will be the 1998-2006 era 2.0
Strome getting a bit of love is nice to see. Another cautionary tale (and he may or may not work out long term) about putting too much on a young player, especially guys in their early 20s. I saw him play a lot in the OHL and he was so good he didn’t need to work that hard-now he is trying.
Debrincat is rarely mentioned, unless he makes a bad pass. He’s one of best pure goal scorers in Hawk history, who just turned 24. He works as hard as anyone and does a lot of the greasy work in the corners. I can’t imagine how popular he would be in Montreal or Toronto.
I agree with the comments above: Chris Vosters sounds like the best yet for replacing Floey. He’s got knowledge and energy-although he needs to stop calling the ice a ‘sheet’ every 30 seconds and use it more sparingly. Jakub Galvas looked great, so did Mitchell during his time out there. Caleb Jones looks worse every time he plays. Winning faceoffs really helps to control play-what a concept. Overll, if they could play simple games like this more and more, they might actually string together 6-7 wins and get above .500.
Regarding the PP – Jones will obviously slot back in to PP1 but hopefully Hagel will replace Dach on PP1 when out of protocol
I like Strome on PP1 so you could roll with 4 88 17 12 and 38 – Toews would be good the way he is playing now but for endurance reasons I don’t think he can play both PP and PK and we need him on the PK more right now
Dach doesn’t look like he really knows what to do on the PP – Kane set him up for a clean look in the high slot in the 3rd and instead of shooting he tried to force a pass to Cat who wasn’t ready or open and pffft – nothing out of what should have been a very good chance
It’s that type of misreading of the play that Dach needs to improve on the most – he’s good on the PK generally so keep him there and take him off the PP1 for Hagel who can shoot and pass and will hound pucks as well as anyone
interesting that galvas had six minutes more toi even strength than mitchell in addition to seven minutes toi on the power play. and that beaudin seems to be yesterday’s news in addition to kalynuk.
i thought galvas looked comfortable and confident and apparently king did as well. it appears to me that on the hawks backline only s jones is a better skater and puck handler than galvas. i am all for running him up the flag pole and see who salutes. there is absolutely no reason for murphy, mc cabe, de haan, or any other current hawks d-man not named s jones to be playing every night. galvas appears to bring skills to the ice that the other day-men, save s jones, simply do not have. i would love to see galvas dressed every night until he proves he doesn’t belong. second pairing and qb on second pp unit. maybe the hawks catch lightning in the bottle. no harm in giving him an opportunity. this team is going nowhere and the other backliners are as skilled as they ever will be. which isn’t all that much.
a lot of buzz around fleury trade to edmonton. their D seems like it could use a more reliable piece too. I wonder if the hawks could trade fleury and a vet D (like dehaan) for a first and prospect or something…any one have any speculation what fleury might be worth in a trade? either way, I’d like them to wait until the deadline just to see what this team can accomplish
If you can get a 1st for Fleury from EDM now don’t wait – as much as I like and respect him MAF is not the future in CHI
They may lose a couple more games without him in net but the value of a #1 pick next year far out weighs that – besides they’re not making the playoffs this year so what would we be keeping him for?
Hawks did a great job against a team that is struggling lately ,Dcat is a 50 goal scorer in the futur
About the kid like Beaudin ,Mitchell,Kalynuk,and others coming from Rockford.like I said before those kids needs time and patience,they need to develop and off course the time they have with the big team is precious but even if they have 10-15 good games with the Hawks doesn’t mean they are ready ,we saw Mitchell last year and Beaudin getting a lot off attention last year then oupps they fall apart because they can’t handle the pace and the pressure in NHL .it will happen again till they are ready .the process can be long sometimes and it doesn’t always work at the end we saw with other players in the pass.
Oilers supposedly interested in Strome too and reunite him with Mcdavid. For Oilers to take on MAF and Strome, the Blackhawks likely have to take back Koskinen caphit for rest of year and eat a bunch of salary to make it work. That would up the return significantly if that were to happen.
ian
at least baby bowman won’t be negotiating. hopefully interim gm tries to prove his mettle by driving a hard bargain from a position of strength.
Ian – yes to Strome and MAF to EDM – had thought of that already
..and as you say should be a good return if KD is up to it – if it happens it could decide his future with the Hawks one way or the other
Caleb Jones had a bad game. Galvas was way better than could have ever been hoped for. Let’s see more of him and less of Stillman please. Yes Stillman had a couple great passes in this game. Yes Dehaan had a great finish, still want to see less of him and more of Mitchell please. Debrincat puts out great effort in the offensive zone, plays bigger than his stature for sure, and once in awhile puts hard effort on a back check (often after he was the one who gave the puck away). He cruises generally in the neutral zone and makes tons of unforgivable giveaways in his own zone and the neutral zone. As awesome as a scorer and fun to watch in the offensive zone as he is, I dont think you can win a cup with guys like him. I like panarin’s and Terravainen’s overall game much more than cat’s. I would swap for either of them in a heartbeat but that’s not happening – sorry Kane. Fleury’s been great but he has to be shaking his head at the way opponents are just allowed to skate out in front of the net from behind the net or in the corner directly to him unimpeded so often and how many times the Hawks d-men end up both together behind the net or in the same corner. It’s unforgivable in beer league hockey and pathetic to see in the NHL.