December breakout stars: One Blackhawks player is heating up

The burning question for all Blackhawks fans probably has the name James Hagens attached to it. Yeah, I wouldn’t go that far just yet, but if the Hawks lose 20 games before they hit the double-digit mark in wins, we can start panicking some. That’s, of course, unless you want to see Hagens team up with Connor Bedard or at least have a chance to. 

Anyway, let’s talk a little not about the possibility of James Hagens coming over or of Bedard, but one player who’s been heating up lately, and one I thought for a minute was finished in the Windy City. Yeah, Taylor Hall, who may still get traded at some point, is finally looking like a valuable player again. 

His recent hat trick in what was a convincing upset win over the Dallas Stars raised some eyebrows and also got on the board with an assist in what was a 6-3 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets. So, are these rumbles of thunder signs that Hall is ready to turn a corner? The might be.

Taylor Hall might be heating up for a memorable December with the Blackhawks

No, last night’s loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs didn’t go the way neither Hall nor anyone on the Blackhawks envisioned. He skated away without a point, but the entire team struggled through a downer of a game. 

It’s also tough to see Hall as part of this team long-term, regardless of what happens to him in December or this season. If he’s still a Hawk until the end of the 2024-25 campaign, do the powers that be want him to stick around? That’s a fair question to ask, but his recent uptick in goals (and points) indicates he might just make the most out of his stay in Chicago, regardless. 

Something else that jumped out at me was that we saw Hall putting up multiple shots per game in three of his last four outings. The loss to Columbus was the only outlier, but it was also the game in which he logged a helper. Then, there was the loss to the Minnesota Wild shortly before that, a matchup in which Hall, despite putting up zero points, logged 18:10 of total ice time, his highest-mark in this five-game stretch. 

Further, Connor Bedard has been heating up, too, having scored a pair of goals in recent outings. So, should Hall at least get somewhat consistent and Bedard end up finding the net more, perhaps the Hawks won’t be so anemic offensively.