Chicago is one of America’s most well-known cities, home to some of the continent’s most iconic sports clubs. However, given these teams’ recent failures, many are dubbing them ‘historically terrible,’ and the statistics make it difficult to refute. The Chicago Bears finished 23rd in the NFL last season, the Blackhawks 31st in the NHL, and the White Sox are now dead last in Major League Baseball.
While there are undoubtedly issues with players and management on each team, at the end of the day, they are all professionals for a reason and can perform at a high level when the proper structure is in place. Looking for the correct structure to reverse Chicago’s recent misfortune, Blackhawks head coach Luke Richardson has reportedly decided to focus solely on player speed. After being impressed by Hampus Lindholm and David Pastrnak’s play in defeating the Toronto Maple Leafs in the 2017 Stanley Cup playoffs, Richardson gave the club permission to create more breakaways.
“In short, [Luke Richardson] is giving Hawks wingers the green light in certain situations to take off behind the opposing defense and try to create more breakaways.”
If two Hawks forwards are fighting for the puck along the boards in the neutral zone, he wants them to try to win it backwards to a waiting defenseman. Meanwhile, he wants the weak-side winger to rush toward the far goal, allowing the defenseman to hit him with a stretch pass or rocket the puck off the far end-wall as a bank pass.”
With little to lose, this could be the ideal move for the Blackhawks. Among those with enough speed are center Andreas “Greece Lightning” Athanasiou, right winger Ilya Mikheyev, and the considerably younger left winger Lukas Reichel, who spent the most of the summer training for the upcoming season. Furthermore, Luke Richardson stated that he had already witnessed an improvement in the speed and overall aggressiveness of the hockey the club was playing from one day of camp to the next.
“I felt it was better than yesterday. I felt it was a very decent tempo with a little bit of toughness, and we’re starting to see some of the things we’re asking them to accomplish. I still want to see us attack the net and shoot.
