When Blackhawks defenseman Artyom Levshunov played with Wyatt Kaiser last spring, he held his own.
When he played with anyone else, he struggled mightily.
The data bears that out. In their 139 minutes of five-on-five ice time together, the Hawks outscored their opponents 5-4 and generated a 46.4% scoring-chance ratio. In Levshunov’s 187 minutes without Kaiser, the Hawks were outscored 12-4 and generated a woeful 34.6% scoring-chance ratio.
It’s logical why, too. Levshunov, at this early stage of his career, remains an extremely chaotic and unpredictable decision-maker. But Kaiser is quick and agile enough to react to and cover for Levshunov’s chaos better than any other Hawks defenseman.
“You see little tendencies, like a little twitch [that tells you], ‘He’s going, so now I’m going,'” Kaiser said in March. “Or if he’s going to stay, we’re going to stay. Your brain subconsciously figures it out.”
New Hawks coach Jeff Blashill watched video from last spring and noticed that pattern, so in his pairings at the start of training camp, he unsurprisingly put Levshunov and Kaiser back together.
During the last two weeks, however, the 19-year-old from Belarus and 23-year-old from Minnesota have developed a chemistry that goes beyond their complementary skills.
They now have a genuine friendship and psychological connection, which could be extra helpful this season as they try to anticipate each other’s decisions.
“[Wyatt] understands Arty,” Blashill said.
Blashill’s complicated and comprehensive new defensive systems have been challenging for Levshunov to learn, but Kaiser has been present — on and off the ice — to explain what he should be doing in every situation.
During one rocky practice for Levshunov last week, for example, Kaiser skated over and physically demonstrated how he should be angling his body to direct the winger toward the boards in one drill.
“I can’t imagine trying to go into a different country and listen,” Kaiser said. “And it’s pretty intense. There’s a lot of pressure on you making passes, making the right plays. It’s a second language [to him]. I feel like I understand it pretty well, so I can try to help him a little bit.
“There’s [an element] of being able to read off of his creativity, because he plays hockey very freely — which I like, because I can make plays off of it. But learning the new system, especially with the language barrier…is going to take us a little bit of time.”
Levshunov’s English fluency, while limited, is slowly improving. That’s allowing him to better express his robust sense of humor, which is exactly what he did when asked recently about Kaiser’s assistance.
“You’re wrong,” Levshunov said, winking across the locker room. “I explain the system to him.”
Kaiser then admitted he has, on a few occasions, gotten things wrong and needed to be corrected himself.
“I have good communication with him,” Levshunov added. “I tell him all the time, ‘Let’s talk more. Let’s talk all the time.’ It helps us to know the game better.”
The fact the Hawks have seemingly found the perfect partner for Levshunov but haven’t done so for Kevin Korchinski is part of why they’re willing to let the former — but not the latter — actively develop in the NHL this fall.
There will inevitably be more lowlights and learning moments to come for Levshunov, but having Kaiser connected to his hip should keep his roller coaster steady enough.
“When [Arty is] comfortable, he’s really good,” Blashill said. “When he’s not sure what to do … he tends to freeze up a little bit. We talk every day with him, and we’ve just got to keep getting him comfortable with all that stuff. Because he’s got really good ability.
“Just like anybody else, when you’re in a situation where you know what you’re going to do, you’re going to be really confident.”
