{"id":353458,"date":"2025-12-17T07:57:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T07:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/353458\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T07:57:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T07:57:10","slug":"blackhawks-stunned-by-gut-punch-loss-to-maple-leafs-after-strong-road-performance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/353458\/","title":{"rendered":"Blackhawks stunned by ‘gut punch’ loss to Maple Leafs after strong road performance"},"content":{"rendered":"

TORONTO \u2014 Some context is needed to understand the heartbreak of the Blackhawks<\/a>\u2019 3-2 loss to the Maple Leafs on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

The Hawks had worked diligently over the previous 48 hours, making strategic adjustments to give themselves a chance to compete without injured star center Connor Bedard<\/a>. A statistic the Sun-Times calculated Saturday \u2014 that Bedard had scored or assis-ted on 48.4% of the Hawks\u2019 goals this season \u2014 had made its way around the locker room. Players recognized they had to make a philosophical shift.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a team, we\u2019re going to have to make sure we\u2019re shutting things down defensively, because naturally \u2014 statistically \u2014 we probably won\u2019t be scoring as many goals,\u201d defenseman Alex Vlasic said.<\/p>\n

At practice Monday, the Hawks worked on pinning opposing forwards hard against the boards in the corners, then getting support from teammates to win the ensuing battles and get the puck.<\/p>\n

They rehashed that lesson with a non-contact walkthrough during their morning skate Tuesday. That\u2019s something players have praised coach Jeff Blashill for this season: His drills have specific purposes and align with the key points of film meetings.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s nice to have that beaten into your head a little bit,\u201d Vlasic said. \u201cIt makes you think, going into the game, \u2018All right, what have we been working on during the week? What did we talk about in video?\u2019\u2009\u201d<\/p>\n

For 55 minutes against the Maple Leafs, the Hawks believed they\u2019d executed all the things they\u2019d practiced, playing as close to a perfect road game as they could with such an inexperienced roster.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were skating really well, and we were all connected on the forecheck,\u201d forward Jason Dickinson said. \u201cWe were getting on pucks and creating turnovers and opportunities to track back up the ice and get offense. And just playing hard, really.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet there was no reward \u2014 all stemming from a disastrous eight-second sequence with three minutes left in the third period. First, defenseman Wyatt Kaiser got tied up behind the net on the penalty kill. Leafs forward William Nylander then poked a loose puck into the slot, allowing captain Auston Matthews to rip a shot over goalie Spencer Knight to tie the game 2-2.<\/p>\n

Off the ensuing faceoff, Knight recklessly kicked a dumped-in puck into the empty slot. Leafs center Dakota Joshua beat unsuspecting defenseman Louis Crevier to the puck and scored, sending Scotiabank Arena into a frenzy.<\/p>\n

The Hawks, flabbergasted to find themselves suddenly trailing 3-2, were disorganized during their last-gasp sequence with an extra attacker and suffered their 11th loss in their last 14 games \u2014 and their second in two games without Bedard.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou feel like you have control most of the game, and then quick turns,\u201d Kaiser said. \u201cIt\u2019s the game of hockey. Life, too. It\u2019s kind of crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Said Dickinson: \u201cThat one sucks. I felt like we played a really good road game for about 90% of it. .\u2009.\u2009. It really was a matter of those three chances [where] they burned us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blashill praised the Hawks\u2019 overall performance, noting that they brought the key ingredients they need to succeed without Bedard. They got dirty goals from unlikely sources, including their third shorthanded goal of the season from Dickinson, and played solid defense, allowing only 20 shots during five-on-five play.<\/p>\n

But a lack of killer instinct and a poorly timed dose of bad luck undid all of that good. The Hawks will be hard-pressed to mentally recover from what both Blashill and Kaiser called a \u201cgut punch\u201d before they face the Canadiens on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s super disappointing because we played good enough to win, but we\u2019ve got to find a way to finish it, obviously,\u201d Blashill said. \u201cIf we do that again Thursday, I think we\u2019ll put ourselves in a good position to win. Now we\u2019ve got to find a way to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 Some context is needed to understand the heartbreak of the Blackhawks\u2019 3-2 loss to the Maple…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353459,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-353458","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=353458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353458\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}