Chicago Blackhawks: New look Predators team come to town
The Chicago Blackhawks are going to try and secure the four-game homestand being no less than a .500 one when the Nashville Predators visit.
The Chicago Blackhawks are a team looking to improve on their current four-game homestand. They have the team directly ahead of them in the Central Division standings coming to town in the Nashville Predators. To be honest, nobody expected the Nashville Predators and Chicago Blackhawks to be anywhere close to each other in the standings by mid-January. Chicago is right where they should be, a bubble team at best in the Western Conference. The Predators have a Stanley Cup roster but they have been awful.
In fact, they have been so awful that they just fired their coach Peter Laviolette. They hired recently fired New Jersey Devils coach John Hynes to be their third head coach in franchise history. You know it was bad in Nashville if they fired Laviolette who was as successful as any coach in the league during his time there. Laviolette’s teams are not known for generating a lot of offense but then they went and hired Hynes who had similar criticisms in New Jersey.
The Blackhawks need to take advantage of them being so down right now. They were just drubbed by the Boston Bruins at home in Hynes’ debut on Tuesday night by a final score of 6-2. The Blackhawks need to play their high octane game in order to beat them. Their goaltending duo of Pekka Rinne and Juuse Saros is normally one of the best in the league but this year they have been very lousy. If they are able to use players like Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane to create high danger chances, they will have a chance to win.
This is a game that can be won using special teams as well. The Predators have the 30th out of 31st worst penalty kill in the entire National Hockey League. The Blackhawks power play is bad but going up against a kill like that could help them gain some confidence with the man advantage. The Preds also have a power play that is ranked 23rd going up against the Blackhawks 9th ranked penalty kill. If the Blackhawks play to these percentages they will also have a really good chance to win.
Where Nashville can beat you is their defense. Roman Josi is likely going to be nominated for the Norris Trophy as the league’s top defenseman. He has been so awesome as he leads the team in scoring with 45 points. It is awesome that he is doing this well but it is not good that guys that are paid to be top forwards like Matt Duchene, Fillip Forsberg, and Ryan Johansen are not right there with him. Josi is supported by some other elite defensemen in Ryan Ellis and Mattias Ekholm. If some of those forwards could match the intensity of those defensemen they would be a really well-rounded team.
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The Blackhawks might not have a better roster on paper than Nashville but so far this season it feels like they care about winning and playing like a team a lot more. That is part of success in sports, especially hockey. Hopefully, the Blackhawks are able to take advantage of this fragile Nashville team in a very exciting Thursday night game.