Blackhawks Locker Room: ‘We just didn’t have energy’

CHICAGO — The Chicago Blackhawks entered tonight’s game against the Detroit Red Wings with an opportunity to do something never before seen in Connor Bedard’s tenure in Chicago, win three games in a row. Unfortunately, the Hawks fell 4-1 at home, Bedard will have to wait.

With goals from Alex DeBrincat, Dylan Larkin, Joe Veleno and Andrew Copp, the Blackhawks were not able to match the Red Wings high flying offense. Captain Nick Foligno scored the Hawks lone goal.

Part of what made the difference tonight had to be the Red Wings amount of odd-man rushes. Detroit had the Blackhawks number tonight, catching them sleeping with plenty of odd-man rushes to capitalize on.

“I think they’re a team that cheats on offense, right?” Foligno said after the loss. “They want to try to sneak by you. They’re going to take that risk in hoping that you’re going to play on the opposite side of them and we kind of fed into it a little bit at the end.”

Alternate captain Connor Murphy echoed Foligno’s comments on the Red Wings chances offensively. Murphy mentioned that it wasn’t a failing structure that hurt the Hawks tonight but a lack of understanding the details.

“We knew going into it they were a rush team, and then we ended up giving them rushes, whether it was two-on-ones or three or four-on-twos,” Murphy said. “They got their chances there, and we’re not a team that can break the game wide open. We don’t necessarily have enough to be able to just make it a track meet and a high-scoring match.”

While it might feel like a lifetime ago at this point, Murphy saw the United Center from a different side at one point. Before he was a Blackhawk, Murphy was a member of the Arizona Coyotes, and he remembers playing at the U. C. before joining the team.

“The United Center was known years ago to be a hard place to play in on the road,” he said, “and we haven’t made it that so far this year.”

Murphy added that the Hawks have not been good enough at home. In fact, the team has played better on the road with a 4-4-1 record. Foligno credited the Blackhawks road success to taking a more business approach.

“I think we probably just understand it’s a more simple game, simple approach,” Foligno said. “I think we get in front of our crowd and for whatever reason we feel we have to put on a show. It’s just simplifying.”

Tonight’s game was on TNT, for a collection of Blackhawks fans, this was a rare opportunity to watch the team live due to the network issues with the Chicago Sports Network. While talking about the Blackhawks road success, Foligno mentioned the importance of putting on a show at home.

“We’ve got to figure it out at home, especially when we’re not on TV,” he said. “We’ve got to find a way to get our fans excited about us playing here. It’s disappointing tonight.”

Blackhawks head coach Luke Richardson’s thoughts on the loss:

“It was disappointing,” he said. “We just didn’t have energy, I thought, most of the night. Just a couple of poor decisions at times.”

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