Blackhawks Fall 6-3 to NHL-Worst Canucks in Reshuffled Roster's First Game

Game Summary

This was supposed to be a chance for the Blackhawks to steady themselves at home after a grueling road trip. Instead, the NHL-worst Vancouver Canucks — who entered having lost 10 of 11 and hadn't won since January 29 — came into the United Center and handed Chicago a 6-3 loss on Friday night, snapping a seven-game skid in the process. The Blackhawks fall to 23-29-10 and have now dropped five of six since returning from the Olympic break. The last time Vancouver won before tonight, Arvid Soderblom was making his first start of the second half. He made his second one here, and allowed four goals on 20 shots.

The first period was a sprint. Ryan Donato put Chicago ahead at 1:08 on a backhand, assisted by Frank Nazar. It lasted 60 seconds. Drew O'Connor tied it at 2:08 on a tip, Jake DeBrusk made it 2-1 Vancouver at 2:32 on another tip, and Teddy Blueger pushed it to 3-1 at 6:32. Three Vancouver goals in four and a half minutes. Ilya Mikheyev pulled one back at 12:00 to make it 3-2 — but the damage from that early stretch was significant, and Chicago entered the second period already chasing.

They caught up, briefly. Frank Nazar tied it 3-3 on a tip with 43 seconds left in the second period, his eighth goal of the season, assisted by Alex Vlasic and Mikheyev. The United Center had something to be loud about. It didn't last a full three minutes into the third. Alex Vlasic drew a high-sticking penalty at 1:36, and Brock Boeser converted on the power play at 2:40 in a way that felt almost cosmically unfair — Linus Karlsson's cross-ice feed ramped up Soderblom's stick and bounced into the air, and Boeser batted it past the goaltender before anyone could react. Just like that, it was 4-3. Max Sasson added an empty-netter at 18:34 and Boeser capped it with another at 19:44, and that was the game.

Chicago went 0-for-3 on the power play and lost the faceoff battle badly — Vancouver won 67.3% of draws on the night. The Blackhawks had 23 shots to the Canucks' 22, so possession wasn't the issue. Execution was. The goals-against came at the worst possible times, and when the Canucks needed a bounce in the third, they got one off a goaltender's stick.

Three Stars

The New-Look Roster

This was, in almost every sense, a different team than the one that took the ice in Winnipeg three days ago. Nick Foligno was traded to Minnesota in the hours before puck drop — the final move of a four-deal deadline week that also sent Connor Murphy, Jason Dickinson, and Colton Dach to Edmonton. Andrew Mangiapane, acquired from Edmonton in the Wednesday Dickinson/Dach deal, made his Blackhawks debut. Wyatt Kaiser returned to the lineup on defense. The roster had more new faces than familiar ones in several spots, and it showed.

Mangiapane played 8:52 in his first game in a Blackhawks sweater and didn't register a point. That's not particularly surprising — he was dealt two days ago, had no practice time with this group, and was plugged into a lineup that was still absorbing a lot of change. Connor Bedard finished without a point for the second straight game, going -2 in 23:22 of ice time. The faceoff issue was glaring: Chicago won just 32.7% of draws on the night. With Dickinson gone — one of the better defensive faceoff men on the roster — that problem isn't going away on its own. There were moments of promise, particularly from Nazar (a goal and an assist, second star) and Mikheyev (a goal and an assist), but for the most part this was a group still finding its footing after a week that fundamentally changed the identity of the team.

The result was ugly, and the opponent makes it sting a little more. Vancouver came in as the worst team in the NHL. Whatever the front office does at the deadline, the results still have to show up on the ice, and right now they aren't.

Looking Ahead

The Blackhawks head to Dallas on Sunday for a 5:00 p.m. CT puck drop on ESPN+. The Stars enter at 38-14-10 with 86 points — second in the Central Division and one of the Western Conference's best teams. It's about as tough a road test as exists on the schedule. Chicago is now 56 points, one point ahead of St. Louis, and four back of Winnipeg — a gap that keeps widening. The deadline week is over, the roster is set, and the remaining games belong entirely to the young core that Davidson spent the week clearing space for.

The silver lining of Friday's loss, if there is one, is that the new lineup has nowhere to go but up. Mangiapane hasn't had a practice. The players who remain are still processing a week in which their captain, their defensive anchor, and two other teammates were gone within 72 hours. Sunday in Dallas will be the second game of what is now clearly a development stretch — not a playoff push. How Bedard, Nazar, Greene, Moore, Levshunov, Rinzel and the rest respond to losing and adjusting is the only storyline left that really matters.