VANCOUVER, British Columbia — The Blackhawks wanted, intended and were built to be better this season.
And they have been more competitive. Eight of their 11 losses have been by one goal, excluding empty-net goals, and they’ve been blown out only once in their first 17 games.
But are the 6-10-1 Hawks actually better, especially when compared to the rest of the league? The jury is still out on that.
As of Friday, they sat one point out of a tie for last place in the NHL and six points out of a playoff spot. The leaguewide floor seems higher this season than most — the Canadiens’ not-that-awful 5-10-2 record is the worst in the NHL — so the bottom tier isn’t as clearly defined.
In the last few weeks in particular, the Hawks have looked alarmingly similar to the outmatched teams of recent seasons past. In six games since the start of November, their 36.7% expected-goals ratio during five-on-five play ranks 31st in the NHL, ahead of only the Sharks’.
They’ll enter their game Saturday against the Canucks, the one team that already has blown them out, having scored only one regulation goal in four consecutive games. The outlook isn’t rosy.
If the Hawks fail to escape the NHL’s basement this season, however, there will be one silver lining: That would put them in position for another top-five draft pick.
General manager Kyle Davidson owed it to fans to try to give them a more watchable product this season, so the Hawks couldn’t reasonably tank intentionally again. Privately, however, he might not be terribly heartbroken — at least from a long-term perspective — if the outcome winds up being comparable to the last two tank seasons.
That certainly would give Davidson a golden opportunity to address the one remaining hole in the Hawks’ prospect pool: a second elite forward to complement Connor Bedard down the road.
Davidson has claimed he’s ‘‘comfortable’’ with the state of the pool as it stands, with the caveat that he’s ‘‘not saying we’ve got this all figured out.’’ Nonetheless, by trying to trade for the Blue Jackets’ No. 4 overall pick on the draft floor last June with the idea of selecting Ivan Demidov, Davidson signaled he knows that’s something the Hawks need — or would benefit significantly from having.
That trade falling through means the Hawks kept their first-round pick in the draft next summer, and Davidson likely will target a forward with that pick, no matter what.
It landing in the top five, however, would give him a chance to draft one of the semi-consensus top four forwards: James Hagens, Porter Martone, Michael Misa and Roger McQueen.
Entering the season, a small but tuned-in portion of the Hawks’ fan base was rooting for that to happen, worrying that Davidson was pulling the Hawks out of the tanking stage prematurely to satisfy the masses. More fans are joining that group as the season progresses.
Before the Canadiens the last three years, the most recent franchise to draft in the top five in three consecutive years was the Oilers in 2014-16 — a stretch that yielded two superstars (Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl) and one bust (Jesse Puljujarvi).
The Hawks will hope neither Bedard, Artyom Levshunov nor their top 2025 pick turns out to be a bust. On the other hand, it’s precisely a Draisaitl-type player that they would love to have next to Bedard.
Failing to escape the NHL’s basement this season wouldn’t necessarily be a good thing all around, though.
Tyler Bertuzzi’s and Teuvo Teravainen’s lack of impact during the first month of their respective four- and three-year contracts is concerning, as is coach Luke Richardson’s indecisiveness with the depth chart and inability so far to find a set of four lines that click.