The Chicago Blackhawks opened their preseason slate the way it closed a lot of games a year ago — competitive, undone by special teams, and searching for answers on the back end. The Hawks lost 3-2 in overtime to the Minnesota Wild on Saturday night, with Tyler Pitlick deflecting home the winner 3:58 into the extra frame off a Hunter Haight–Daemon Hunt feed. It’s one preseason game. But some of what showed up on the ice Saturday is worth sitting with as camp rolls on.
The Game
Minnesota struck first, with Rieger Lorenz burying a wrist shot at 7:56 of the first period off a Dallas Gambrell–Daemon Hunt setup. Chicago answered four minutes later when Dominic Toninato tied it at 12:12, with Kevin Korchinski and Gavin Hayes drawing the assists. Dillon Boucher put the Hawks ahead 2-1 early in the second, finishing a Connor Mylymok–Sacha Boisvert feed, before Nico Sturm tipped one home for Minnesota in the third to force overtime. Pitlick settled it from there.
The shot totals tell the real story of the game: Minnesota out-attempted Chicago 26-16, and the Wild controlled play for long stretches, particularly in the first period, when they out-shot the Hawks 14-4. Chicago’s response was to out-work the game rather than out-play it — 41 hits, 14 blocked shots, and a 61.4 percent night on faceoffs (27-for-44). That’s a team compensating for a puck-possession deficit with effort, which is fine in September but isn’t a plan.
Three Hawks Worth Watching
Kevin Korchinski: The stat sheet undersells what he did Saturday — a primary assist on the tying goal, a team-high 25:25 of ice time, and 3:55 of penalty-kill duty mixed in. What stood out more is how he looked doing it. Korchinski has visibly added strength over the offseason, and it shows in how he handles pucks along the wall and how quickly he transitions the puck up ice.
He and Ethan Del Mastro have been the subject of trade speculation and “what’s the long-term plan here” stories for weeks now. A camp like this is exactly how a player changes that conversation.
AJ Spellacy: If you blinked, you might have missed him on the scoresheet, but Spellacy was all over Chicago’s penalty kill — 5:18 of shorthanded time in the first period alone, plus two hits and a blocked shot on the night. He’s not going to be a name that jumps off a highlight reel, but the Hawks were 5-for-5 on the kill Saturday, and Spellacy was a big reason why. Chicago needs players who can be trusted in exactly these situations, and he passed the test.
Ethan Del Mastro: A quieter night — an early interference penalty was the headline moment — but he logged real minutes in a game that mattered more for evaluation than for the score. Del Mastro is in the same boat as Korchinski: talented, waiting for a real opportunity, and running out of time to make the decision easy for the front office. Worth tracking how his ice time trends as the preseason goes on.
Same Issue, New Season: The Power Play
Here’s the part that should worry Chicago more than the loss itself. The Hawks went 0-for-4 on the power play Saturday. That’s a preseason game, sure, but it’s also exactly the problem that plagued this team all of last season, when Chicago’s power play finished 29th in the league. The penalty kill, by contrast, looked sharp — perfect on five chances, with Toninato, Spellacy, and Landon Slaggert all logging heavy shorthanded minutes. A team that can kill penalties but can’t score on the man advantage is leaving points on the table, and that’s been true in Chicago for a while now. New pieces on that power-play unit were supposed to change this. One game in, it hasn’t yet.
The Bigger Picture
None of this happens in a vacuum. The Athletic’s season model has Chicago projected anywhere from 60 to 90 points depending on how the kids develop, and the swing factor is defense — 16 of the Blackhawks’ 18 skaters carry a projected negative Defensive Rating this year, and Chicago allowed more high-danger chances against than any team in the league last season. The Bowen Byram trade was supposed to stabilize the back end at the top, but he profiles more as a No. 2 than a true No. 1, which puts real pressure on Artyom Levshunov and Sam Rinzel to take a jump neither has shown yet.
And then there’s Connor Bedard, who wasn’t in the lineup Saturday as he continues working back from offseason shoulder surgery. Before he got hurt in mid-December last season, Bedard was fifth in the NHL in scoring and playing like a top-five player in the world. He never fully got that back after returning. Chicago’s entire season hinges on which version of Bedard shows up once he’s cleared, and on whether his game away from the puck — an actual, well-documented weakness — takes a step forward with it. One NHL executive who spoke to The Athletic put it simply: “I think he’s going to get there.”
Coach’s Take: Patience With Korchinski
My take of the night is on Korchinski, because his story is bigger than one preseason game. He went 7th overall in the 2023 draft, played his rookie season with the big club, and then took a step back over the following two years. You can point at the organization for how he was used and developed in that stretch, or you can point at the player — realistically, it’s probably some of both. But that’s behind him now. He’s still a young defenseman who’s developing, and the development isn’t always a straight line. I believe in the kid, and I think we need to be patient with him.
What I saw Saturday backs that up. He looked stronger, more in control of his minutes, and he was the guy driving the tying goal from the back end. Maybe the front office has already made up its mind about what this season looks like for him. But if Korchinski keeps playing like he did Saturday, he makes that decision a lot harder on them — and if he does start the year somewhere other than Chicago, don’t be surprised if the call-up comes sooner than expected.
Happy to be back covering the Hawks for Hockey Hot Stove, and looking forward to putting out more articles weekly this season.
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