The Little Things Do In Blackhawks In Loss to Blue Jackets

Kent Johnson and Connor Bedard spent their Friday night having dinner together. Johnson spent Saturday night terrorizing his buddy’s team in leading the Columbus Blue Jackets to a 5-1 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks.

Johnson gave the Blue Jackets a 1-0 lead four minutes into the game, shortly after Landon Slaggert failed to win a board battle in clear the zone. Bedard thought he tied the game about two minutes later, but the goal was waived off for contact with the goaltender. The call was iffy at best, but Anders Sorensen decided not to challenge the call.

Midway through the period, Blue Jackets goaltender Elvis Merzlikins went out for a stroll and ended up at his one blue line. Moments later, Boone Jenner coughed up the puck, causing Merlikins to make a leaping stop from above the circle. The goal wouldn’t have counted since Lukas Reichel was offside on the play.

Johnson doubled the Columbus lead early in the second period with a power-play goal through heavy traffic. The Blackhawks got on the board three minutes later with a power-play tally of their own. After a clean faceoff win by Frank Nazar, Craig Smith redirected an Alex Vlasic shot on its way by for his eighth goal of the season. Later in the frame, moments after a missed slashing call on Ryan Donato, Denton Mateychuk fired a wrist shot that had no business going in past Petr Mrazek’s glove hand.

The Blackhawks pushed in the first half of the third period. Nick Foligno had a couple of good looks from in close but could not finish. Moments later, Zach Werenski made it 4-1 on a breakaway after all five Blackhawks were low in the zone. Both defensemen pinched down, and no forward, namely, Philipp Kurashev, moved to the top of the zone. Less than a minute later, T.J. Brodie got pushed the puck, which led to an Adam Fantilli goal.

The Blackhawks won’t have long to stew over tonight’s performance. They will host the Toronto Maple Leafs tomorrow, who beat the Carolina Hurricanes 6-3 tonight.

Closer Than the Final Score

If you look at the final score on your handy NHL app, you’d think the Blue Jackets ran the Blackhawks out of the building. That just wasn’t the case. These teams were even at 26 5v5 shot attempts apiece through 40 minutes, and the Blue Jackets finished with a 39-37 advantage. The Blackhawks had a 28-21 advantage in shots on goal, the first time they’ve outshot an opponent since the Winter Classic on Dec. 31.

It was the little things that cost the Blackhawks tonight. Losing one-on-one battles, failing to win defensive zone draws, and the lack of finish cost them the game. The game could have been entirely different if Bedard’s goal wasn’t disallowed, Pat Maroon hadn’t hit the post late in the second period, and Foligno buried one of his point-blank chances in the final frame. But we’ve seen this all season, where the Blackhawks can’t make their own breaks.

Many felt Sorensen should have challenged the overturned goal, but he said after the game that the bench was rushed into their decision.

“We actually thought it was a kicking motion at first,” he said. “And then he came over, after we called him over, and said that it was goalie interference, and we needed to make a decision quickly. The way our challenges have been going lately when they call it no goal, it seems harder to reverse those. And then, looking back, I think we would’ve lost the challenge.”

Frank Nazar Continues to Make Strides

While watching the game, it looked like Nazar was passing the eye test for being one of the best players on the ice. Then the stats back that up. In 12:12 of 5v5 ice time, the Blackhawks had eight of the 14 shot attempts when Nazar was on the ice for a 57.1 Corsi for percentage (CF%). They outshot the Blue Jackets 6-3, but he was unfortunately on the ice for two goals against. According to Hockey Stat Cards, Nazar was the second-best Blackhawk on the night.

Nazar did some of his best work at the faceoff dot. His clean faceoff win earned him a secondary assist on the Blackhawks’ lone goal. He was the best centerman on the draw. On a night where the Blackhawks lost 61% of the faceoffs, Nazar won six of his nine. Tonight was his fourth game out of the last five where he won at least 50% of his faceoffs.

Another Rough Night for T.J. Brodie

Coaches and analysts talk a lot about gap control and being strong on the puck. These are always keys to victory, especially when it comes to defensemen. Brodie struggled at both of those aspects tonight.

Mrazek should have saved the Blue Jackets’ third goal, but Brodie could have done more to prevent the shot. The second Mateychuk entered the zone, Brodie needed to step up and close the gap between him and the shooter. Instead, he paused for a second, and that was all that was needed to provide the time and space to get the shot off.

Brodie lost two one-one-battles on Columbus’ final goal. First, Dmitri Voronkov easily pushed him off the puck. After he recovered, he failed to get Kirill Marchenko off the puck, who found Fantilli in the slot for the dagger.

When Brodie is on his game, he is a serviceable third-pairing defenseman. But when he’s having an off night, he’s downright bad. Every game he dresses, he takes away playing time for Nolan Allan or Ethan Del Mastro, two defensemen who are part of the future. This has to stop. The March 7 trade deadline will likely open up some spots on the blue line, but the youngsters shouldn’t wait until then to get regular playing time.