5 Negative Takeaways From the Chicago Blackhawks’ First Half of the Season

The offense is bad, like really bad.

The Chicago Blackhawks are tied with the San Jose Sharks for the worst average goals per game with 2.08. The Hawks have the worst power play in the league. They also rank dead last in shooting percentage.

The advanced stats are also not kind to the offense. The Blackhawks have the worst expected goal-for-percentage, high-danger chances, and second-to-worst high-danger goals.

Connor Bedard has missed the last 11 games and the Blackhawks have been shut out in four of those contests. They have scored just one goal in four other games while Bedard nurses a fractured jaw.

The offense was not a juggernaut when Bedard was in the lineup. Not having his scoring and playmaking ability has rendered the offense useless. The Hawks are playing hard, but they just do not have the talent to get the puck past the goalie right now.

It is going to be hard to watch for another month as Bedard is not expected back to at least early March.

The road losing streak.

The Blackhawks are in the middle of a franchise-record 20-game losing streak. They last won away from the United Center on November 5th of 2023 against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Their past four shutout defeats have come on the road.

The Hawks had some chances to pick up some road wins during this losing streak. They were up on the St. Louis Blues 5-2 two days before Christmas, but Soderblom melted down and the Hawks lost 7-5. They lost in overtime on December 29th at Dallas. They almost pulled off a stunning win at Winnipeg earlier this month before losing 2-1.

Losing was going to happen this season since it was the first one after the roster teardown was completed. What is hard to take is the Hawks have picked up just one point in the standings during this 20-game losing skid. They are not even taking games into overtime.

The streak cannot last forever. They do have some road games against San Jose and Anaheim, so hopefully they can snap the skid there.

Jarred Tinordi and Taylor Raddysh have been bad.

A running theme this season has been Tinordi watching goals go in. The defenseman has not been very good this season. Ideally, he would be a healthy scratch, but injuries to the blue line have forced him to still get ice time.

Raddysh has been invisible this season after a career year last season. It is looking like the Hawks will let him walk in the offseason after he showed a ton of promise.

The hope is the defensive unit gets healthy so Tinordi can watch games from the press box and Raddysh uses the All-Star break to refocus.