TORONTO — Some context is needed to understand the heartbreak of the Blackhawks’ 3-2 loss to the Maple Leafs on Tuesday night.
The Hawks had worked diligently over the previous 48 hours, making strategic adjustments to give themselves a chance to compete without injured star center Connor Bedard. A statistic the Sun-Times calculated Saturday — that Bedard had scored or assis-ted on 48.4% of the Hawks’ goals this season — had made its way around the locker room. Players recognized they had to make a philosophical shift.
“As a team, we’re going to have to make sure we’re shutting things down defensively, because naturally — statistically — we probably won’t be scoring as many goals,” defenseman Alex Vlasic said.
At practice Monday, the Hawks worked on pinning opposing forwards hard against the boards in the corners, then getting support from teammates to win the ensuing battles and get the puck.
They rehashed that lesson with a non-contact walkthrough during their morning skate Tuesday. That’s something players have praised coach Jeff Blashill for this season: His drills have specific purposes and align with the key points of film meetings.
“It’s nice to have that beaten into your head a little bit,” Vlasic said. “It makes you think, going into the game, ‘All right, what have we been working on during the week? What did we talk about in video?’ ”
For 55 minutes against the Maple Leafs, the Hawks believed they’d executed all the things they’d practiced, playing as close to a perfect road game as they could with such an inexperienced roster.
“We were skating really well, and we were all connected on the forecheck,” forward Jason Dickinson said. “We were getting on pucks and creating turnovers and opportunities to track back up the ice and get offense. And just playing hard, really.”
Yet there was no reward — all stemming from a disastrous eight-second sequence with three minutes left in the third period. First, defenseman Wyatt Kaiser got tied up behind the net on the penalty kill. Leafs forward William Nylander then poked a loose puck into the slot, allowing captain Auston Matthews to rip a shot over goalie Spencer Knight to tie the game 2-2.
Off the ensuing faceoff, Knight recklessly kicked a dumped-in puck into the empty slot. Leafs center Dakota Joshua beat unsuspecting defenseman Louis Crevier to the puck and scored, sending Scotiabank Arena into a frenzy.
THE LEAFS TAKE THE LEAD 8 SECONDS AFTER TYING IT 😱🤯 pic.twitter.com/4C702DqyXJ
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) December 17, 2025
The Hawks, flabbergasted to find themselves suddenly trailing 3-2, were disorganized during their last-gasp sequence with an extra attacker and suffered their 11th loss in their last 14 games — and their second in two games without Bedard.
“You feel like you have control most of the game, and then quick turns,” Kaiser said. “It’s the game of hockey. Life, too. It’s kind of crazy.”
Said Dickinson: “That one sucks. I felt like we played a really good road game for about 90% of it. . . . It really was a matter of those three chances [where] they burned us.”
Blashill praised the Hawks’ overall performance, noting that they brought the key ingredients they need to succeed without Bedard. They got dirty goals from unlikely sources, including their third shorthanded goal of the season from Dickinson, and played solid defense, allowing only 20 shots during five-on-five play.
But a lack of killer instinct and a poorly timed dose of bad luck undid all of that good. The Hawks will be hard-pressed to mentally recover from what both Blashill and Kaiser called a “gut punch” before they face the Canadiens on Thursday.
“It’s super disappointing because we played good enough to win, but we’ve got to find a way to finish it, obviously,” Blashill said. “If we do that again Thursday, I think we’ll put ourselves in a good position to win. Now we’ve got to find a way to do it.”