Blackhawks 1, Wild 3 — Three Stars, Key Takeaways

Minnesota’s first goal of the night was an unfortunate wake-up for young Blackhawks defenseman Wyatt Kaiser, who didn’t face many/any players the size of Ryan Reaves in college — where he was playing just two weeks ago. But the effort from Kaiser and the rest of the roster was significantly better than we saw in Washington and, at times, in Colorado earlier. Ryan Hartman made a nice play to win the game with 71 seconds left in regulation.

Star 1: Lukas Reichel

Just as I was considering how invisible the Blackhawks offense had been for 40 minutes, Reichel comes flying up the ice and rips home his fourth NHL goal of the season just 75 seconds into the third period.

Star 2: Jujhar Khaira

He won eight of nine faceoffs in the first two periods. The rest of the team won five of 21 in the opening 40 minutes. I get that there aren’t many qualified centers on the roster any more and Jason Dickinson is doing the heavy lift, but Khaira was the only guy who did anything at the dot.

Star 3: Alex Stalock

When the offense isn’t doing much/anything, it’s up to the goaltender to keep the game close. And once again, Stalock did precisely that, stopping 15 of 16 in the first two periods while his skaters didn’t have many decent scoring chances.

Takeaways

  • The Sharks already lost today 5-3 in Calgary, so the Blackhawks remain within one point of the bottom. Columbus is in Montreal later this evening.
  • Three Blackhawks were tied for the team lead in shots on goal after two periods with three: Boris Katchouk, Connor Murphy and Jarred Tinordi. Yeah, that’s not good.
  • In the middle of the third period, Murphy caught Marcus Foligno with a strong, legal hit. Foligno opted to retaliate with a nasty cross-check and then went as far as dropping the gloves and wanted to fight literally anyone wearing white. The result: two minutes for the Foligno cross-check and two minutes on… Murphy for embellishment?? That seemed like an absolutely brutal call.
  • But hey! At least two Blackhawks prospects — Boston University forward Ryan Greene and goaltender Drew Commesso — are headed to the Frozen Four!
  • This was pretty cool to see before the game. This was a homecoming game for Wyatt Kaiser, who was playing at Minnesota-Duluth just a couple short weeks ago. He had a nice fan club ready to watch him play in the NHL on Saturday afternoon. Kaiser, Alex Stalock and Joey Anderson are all former Bulldogs.
  • I just feel terrible that the kid is going to get on the bus tonight and have a hundred text messages about his singing skills. When he sees the NBCSN crew at the United Center on Sunday he might ask them to “Tell me why!” this got a segment on the intermission report.
  • written by

    Tab Bamford has been writing about the Chicago Blackhawks for almost two decades. He joined Bleacher Nation as the lead Blackhawks writer in May 2022. Tab is a member of the Professional Hockey Writers Association and is the author of two books about the Blackhawks: "100 Things Blackhawks Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die" (Triumph Books) and "Chicago Blackhawks: An Illustrated Timeline" (Reedy Press, 2021). Find him on Twitter/X/Instagram/Threads at @The1Tab

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