The Blackhawks have finished their 2023-24 season.
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A Blackhawks season that began with Connor Bedard and Kevin Korchinski’s rookie laps Oct. 10 in Pittsburgh ended Thursday with a chaotic overtime loss in Los Angeles.
In between, the Hawks mustered only 23 wins in 82 games, falling short of expectations but not in particularly worrying fashion. The team’s win-loss record was always destined to be some form of ugly this season, and whatever form that turned out to be was never going to mean much.
Relatively few players on this current roster are penciled into long-term roles; many are placeholders who will likely move on by 2026, if not sooner. Plenty won’t even return next season, when the Hawks’ future core will start to materialize in the NHL as more and more prospects integrate in.
And for the current young players who are penciled into long-term roles, it takes time to learn how to succeed in the NHL. Some turbulence and inconsistency early on is not just acceptable but anticipated.
As the Hawks turn the page on 2023-24 and shift focus toward another sure-to-be-interesting offseason, here’s a look at the most encouraging and discouraging aspects of the season.
Encouraging: Bedard met expectations
The most-hyped No. 1 overall draft pick in years entered the NHL with ridiculously high expectations and somehow managed to meet all of them except perhaps his own.
Bedard leads all rookies this season in goals (22), assists (39), points (61), power-play points (21), shots on goal (206) and virtually every other offensive statistic. He will likely win the Calder Trophy, but whether he does or not, his first year has been a definite success.
With more experience, less pressure, some preexisting comfort in the NHL, a stronger offensive supporting cast and (hopefully) some improvement defensively, he should only get better next season and beyond.
There don’t seem to have been any deviations from his fast track toward becoming one of the most dangerous forwards in the world, and his presence alone makes the Hawks’ future extremely bright. Very few other franchises possess an asset as valuable as Bedard.
Discouraging: Reichel fell flat
It took Lukas Reichel, the Hawks’ No. 1 prospect pre-Bedard, almost the entire season to match the point total (15) that he accumulated in just 23 NHL games last season. He didn’t tally his 16th point until the finale Thursday, although his breakaway goal was arguably his best play since last season.
That stat exemplifies just how disappointing Reichel was. His mindset improved from fall to spring, but his production didn’t.
The Hawks have no choice but to substantially lower expectations for him long-term. He’s only 21, granted, but they can no longer definitively pencil him into a top-six forward slot in their future depth charts.
He’ll get another contract this summer and another year or two to demonstrate growth and re-earn one of those top-six spots, but that outcome and the alternative possibility that he flames out entirely now seem equally likely.
Mixed bag: Post-Toews leadership
Hawks general manager Kyle Davidson, after deciding to part ways with former captain Jonathan Toews following last season, brought in two well-known, well-traveled veterans last summer to fill the leadership void: Nick Foligno and Corey Perry.
The outcomes of those two decisions couldn’t have possibly been more different.
The fallout from Perry’s workplace misconduct and resulting contract termination in November cast yet another ugly shadow over an organization that has had far too many of those in recent years.
The negative impact on Bedard that indirectly stemmed from the front office’s weeklong silence about the matter, whether prudent or not, then made the situation exponentially worse. It’s unfair to blame Davidson for something he couldn’t have known would happen, but he absolutely must avoid any further situations like this.
Foligno, conversely, proved to be a perfect fit, gracefully and effectively sliding into the captain role — in de facto fashion this season but potentially official fashion moving forward.
Davidson’s decision to extend his contract was a no-brainer, too. The Hawks will benefit from Foligno’s presence the next two seasons.
Encouraging: Richardson’s handling of rookies
Hawks coach Luke Richardson showed a worrying tendency in 2022-23, his first season in charge, to favor veterans over rookies in his lineup decisions and when distributing playing time.
This season, he rightfully and reassuringly adopted the opposite approach, demonstrating a willingness to let his young players learn from trials-by-fire.
He still utilized playing time to reward good play and punish bad play to an extent, but young defensemen like Kevin Korchinski (19:37 average ice time), Alex Vlasic (21:29) and Wyatt Kaiser (17:19) grew significantly over the course of the season because they got to play so much.
Vlasic, in particular, arguably deserves his own bullet point as one of the most encouraging aspects of the Hawks’ season.
Previously best characterized as a B-grade prospect, his emergence as one of the best defensive defensemen in the NHL was both surprising and thrilling. He now looks like a cornerstone for many years to come.
Discouraging: More losses coming
The in-season contract extensions given to Foligno, Jason Dickinson and Petr Mrazek through 2026 shed light on exactly how much longer Davidson expects this rebuild to take.
That seems like the summer the Hawks will begin spending to the salary cap, partially because that’s when Bedard, Korchinski and Frank Nazar will need new contracts but also partially because they’ll start operating aggressively on the free-agent and trade markets.
In the meantime, however, the Hawks probably won’t be playoff contenders, at least barring some surprisingly fast development by and cohesion between the plethora of prospects they plan to integrate.
That means two more seasons of more losses than wins. That might be sensible, but that nonetheless sounds quite unpleasant right now — with the Hawks having just concluded their seventh consecutive losing season, their third consecutive season with one of the league’s worst records and their losingest season ever.
Mixed bag: Goaltending
Speaking of unpleasant, imagine how bad the Hawks would’ve been this season if Mrazek hadn’t enjoyed a career renaissance.
That conjures up a truly hideous mental picture. Bedard has called Mrazek the team’s MVP, and it’s difficult to argue against his opinion.
The mental picture is equally hideous if one imagines Arvid Soderblom starting the majority of games, something the Hawks actually hoped entering the season that his play would justify.
That did not happen; the 24-year-old Swede instead suffered through one of the worst goaltending seasons in franchise history, posting an .879 save percentage. The fact his contract runs through 2025 will give him an opportunity next season to turn his career trajectory around, but it would be ludicrous at this point to continue penciling him in as the Hawks’ goalie of the future.
Notable goalie prospects Drew Commesso and Adam Gajan also produced just-OK seasons in the AHL and USHL, respectively, so the Hawks’ long-term goaltending outlook looks less rosy now than it did last summer.