Hawk Thoughts: 'Twas the Week Before Christmas
A recap of last weeks Blackhawks news, just in time for Christmas.
My little brain is sore from dreaming about being stuck in a cave with zombie bears. I think it was a vision or something about a certain football team. Whatever it was, I'm a little slow today, and doing a game recap just isn't happening. But I have that itch to write. Temporarily bringing Blackhawks weekly updates to this website, which was something I did for a while over at Substack.
Do not expect this to be a regular thing.
Game Recaps
The Hawks won 3 games in a row this past week. Read that again. Don't believe me? I don't blame you. This was the first time the Hawks won 3 in a row since 2023 when Patrick Kane was still a Hawk.
Connor Bedard scored 3 points on Saturday against the Flames. Connor's goal and 2 assists gave him 29 points in 34 games. His career total is 90 points in 102 games.
Ilya Mikheyev is on a "hot one" with 5 goals and 6 points in his last four games. I have a conspiracy theory that Mikheyev is really Andreas Athanasiou who is really just Viktor Stalberg. I think Ilya is on a small hot streak before his numbers level out. Prove me wrong and I'll be better for it.
Recently, Ben Pope and Scott Powers put out articles breaking down Frank Nazar's first 5 games of the season. With how Pope worded things, don't be surprised if Nazar gets sent down. Nazar has 0 points in 5 games and Natural Stat Trick has him with 2 shots on goal, 4 shot attempts, and an individual expected goals of .33. Despite the lack of points, Nazar has looked fine.
Stories
Anders Sorensen made quite the quote when he compared Nolan Allan to Niklas Hjalmarsson. Powers wrote more about Allan here. Future-Hammer or not, Allan has been looking solid as of late. I have an itch that he might be a trade piece in the future. The Hawks are loaded with young left-handed defensemen.
Broken players made a return on Saturday. Petr Mrazek and Seth Jones were both activated off of IR. Mrazek's return sent down Drew Commesso and Wyatt Kaiser was sent down ahead of Jones' return. They played Saturday and here's how they looked: Mrazek posted a .828 SV% stopping 24 of 29 shots and Jones had a 0 +/- (3 goals for, 3 against) and an xG% of 51.86.
The World Juniors begin Dec. 26. Oliver Moore will be the player to watch, he will also be wearing a big "A" on his jersey. Unless I'm missing something, he's the only Hawks prospect in the World Juniors.
All City Network decided to Scrouge it up and fire a bunch of people for the holidays. Impacted in the Hawks world was Greg Boysen, who was part of the CHGO crew. I'll be honest, I was never a big CHGO-guy, but Boysen has been a part of the Hawks writer's world for a while. It was a job that he loved and was passionate about. He, amongst other writers, is one of the reasons why I do this for shits and giggles. He started up a Substack, a $6/month subscription, check it out.
Week Ahead
Short hockey week. The Hawks play the Wild tonight at 7PM central before taking a holiday break. After that, they play on Friday, the 27th, in Buffalo at 6PM CT.
I'll be doing a game recap for the Wild game and you're lucky if you get one for the Sabres game. I'm coming home for the holidays, so don't expect too much nonsense from me. Yes. I will be there for the Winter Classic.
To the burglar reading this and planning when to break into my home, I have pressure plate IED's all around my yard, a feral cat with rabies, and a punji pit somewhere in my home. (FBI guy, this is definitely a joke... or is it?)
Let's Go Hawks,