The impact of special teams on the Blackhawks 2025–26 campaign

The Chicago Blackhawks finished the 2025-2026 campaign in second-to-last place in the entire NHL. Many factors led to this poor year, with the majority of the Blackhawks' failings occurring at 5-on-5. They also gave up the fourth most shots in the NHL while taking the fewest shots. However, one of the bright spots of the year occurred when the Blackhawks were on the penalty kill.

Penalty Kill

The Blackhawks finished the year in second place with an 83.6% success rate of killing penalties. We have seen a steady improvement over the past three years on the penalty kill.

2025-2026: 2nd (83.6%)
2024-2025: 14th (79.3%)
2025-2026: 27th (75.8%)

Again, many factors have led to this great improvement. Coaching, personnel, and mindset have led to this success. We have seen the team add significant speed to the roster, and many of these players have been rewarded with penalty-kill time. The majority of the team's top penalty killers were traded away mid-season. This forced the younger skaters to step up, and they did in a big way.

Connor Murphy and Jason Dickinson were in the top five in average time on ice for the penalty kill in 2025-2026 for the Blackhawks, and both were traded to Edmonton before the deadline. Stepping into their place were Louis Crevier and Ilya Mikheyev. The relative Corsi percentage while shorthanded was 6.4 for Mikheyev, which ranked the highest on the team for forwards. This number is very impressive and would rank as one of the highest for forwards in the NHL.

More opportunities were given to Oliver Moore and Frank Nazar on the penalty kill, and their speed disrupted the opponent's ability to get set up. Head coach Blashill encouraged his skaters to be aggressive on the kill, and this benefited them more often than not. Alex Vlasic led the way on the defensive front alongside Crevier; however, major contributions came from Wyatt Kaiser and, when healthy, Matt Grzelcyk.

Power Play

If I have to watch this team fumble around with the ******* 'push-em-back entry' one more time, then I may throw my television through the wall. Now that that is out of the way, the Blackhawks suffered a major regression in their power-play percentage from the 2024-2025 season

2025-2026: 29th (16.9%)
2024-2025: 7th (24.9%)
2025-2026: 28th (16.6%)

As expected, Connor Bedard, Tyler Bertuzzi, and Frank Nazar led the team with ice time while on the power play (Anton Frondell joined that list upon his arrival). The major issue this team faced while on the power play was zone entry. Too often, the team would attempt to push the puck back to either Bedard or Nazar to carry it into the zone. And more often than not, the puck would be intercepted or the play broken up.

Once the team entered the zone, they were left with only a little more than a minute to work. They were able to move the puck well; however, the unwillingness to shoot often left many opportunities on the table. A significant mindset change is needed next season, with an emphasis on shooting first.

The team will have plenty of skill and speed to utilize on the power play, especially if they can pull off a trade for an elite forward. With Artyom Levshunov/Sam Rinzel playing quarterback on the power play, they have plenty of potential to be a top-ten power play if they can fix their zone-entry issues. Overall, the penalty kill was a major strength for the team, while the power play fell short.

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