The Chicago Blackhawks traveled to Texas on Saturday to take on the Dallas Stars. While the Blackhawks were looking to snap a three-game losing streak, the Stars were looking to build upon their 6–2 victory over the Boston Bruins earlier this week.
Before the game, the Blackhawks announced a lineup a change. The much-maligned winger Lukas Reichel was moved up from the fourth line to the top line. Reichel had been playing better after starting the season as a healthy scratch.
Here was the lineup.
Blackhawks lines in warmups vs. Stars feature Reichel on the first line:
Reichel-Bedard-Teravainen
Hall-Kurashev-Bertuzzi
Foligno-Dickinson-Mikheyev
Maroon-Donato-SmithKaiser-Jones
Vlasic-Murphy
Allan-BrodieMrazek
— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) October 26, 2024
First period
In the first period, the Hawks were able to kill off two penalties and failed to score on one power play of their own. After all the special teams play, Evgenii Dadonov scored an even-strength goal to put Dallas up 1–0. The period ended with Dallas up 1–0 and Chicago was very lucky they only trailed by one after the period.
1st intermission: Stars 1, Blackhawks 0
Like the Hawks like last night, the Stars dominated the first period but only have a one-goal lead to show for it.
Shot attempts: 11-35 DAL
Shots on goal: 8-15 DAL
Scoring chances: 4-20 DALHawks will start the second on a full PP.
— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) October 27, 2024
Pope followed up his tweet with more context. The Hawks only had 20 scoring chances the entire game against San Jose in their victory last week.
Second period
In the second period, the Stars added to their lead as Jamie Benn potted his second goal of the season. Benn knocked the puck out of midair for the second goal of the game. The second ended with Chicago trailing Dallas 2–0.
Third period
Dallas extended its lead to 3–0 when Matt Duchene tallied on the power play.
The Blackhawks mounted a comeback led by their fourth line. Ryan Donato got the Hawks on the board with his third goal of the season.
Craig Smith scores his team-leading fourth goal of the season in bizarre fashion.
Dallas thought about challenging for goaltender interference but chose not to. #Blackhawks pic.twitter.com/DZIwbDMLwq
— Charlie Roumeliotis (@CRoumeliotis) October 27, 2024
Later in the third period, Connor Bedard, who had been struggling to find the back of the net to start the season, scored his third goal of the campaign to cut the lead to one at 3–2.
Connor Bedard rips home his third goal of the season. What a shot. #Blackhawks pic.twitter.com/0A6MTag43M
— Charlie Roumeliotis (@CRoumeliotis) October 27, 2024
The comeback did fall short as Duchene put home an empty-netter to cement the victory for the Stars. The final score was 4–2.
Analysis
The story this season has been the Hawks’ inability to play a full 60-minute game. In this game, the Hawks failed to get out of the dressing room until the second period.
With the effort not being there for a whole game, the Hawks’ management might have to start to look at a changing of the coaching staff. The Luke Richardson staff had in the past been able to get better efforts out of teams with less talent. Thus far with more “talent,” the Hawks have yet to play a complete game.
On the positive side of things, Bedard got his second in the last two games. After not scoring goals for four games, the hope is that goals will come in bunches for Bedard, who had struggled scoring prior to this weekend. Bedard also got a new linemate in this contest. Reichel was moved up from the fourth line to the top line and given time on the power play. This is a testament to Reichel, who has improved his defensive game and now is starting to flash some of his offensive talent. Hopefully the young forward can continue to build on this positive momentum and turn into the player a large portion of the fan base already believes he is.
CHSN update
As the CHSN saga continues, there is still no movement on a deal with Comcast/Xfinity. As Chicago SunTimes Sports Editor Jeff Agrest wrote earlier this week, Comcast is not budging on their desire to have CHSN moved to the Ultimate tier of their cable packages. This move would cost Blackhawks fans $20 dollars or more per month to watch games.
For those who have FuboTV, CHSN has struck a deal with them and their station will be included in the regional sports package. Fans would need to pay $79.99 plus an additional $14.99 per month to watch the Blackhawks.
Prospect update
The Blackhawks’ second overall pick in the 2024 Draft, Artyom Levshunov, made his pro debut with the Rockford IceHogs on Saturday. Levshunov had been injured before the start of training camp and was working his way back ever since.
He had an assist on Cavan Fitzgerald’s first goal in the 5–3 IceHogs victory.
Fitzgerald’s goal earlier in the period https://t.co/tcfU6lpiTY pic.twitter.com/xsUsUm488P
— Rockford IceHogs (@goicehogs) October 26, 2024
The Blackhawks’ next game is Monday against the Colorado Avalanche at 9 p.m. CDT on CHSN.