The defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks don’t have a lot of holes, but their inability to kill penalties has been a major one. They rank in the bottom five of the league in that regard, which is a startling decline from the shortened campaign when they were third with an 87.2% success rate.
They might have turned a corner though as they’ve shut the door the last 23 times they had to kill off a power play. Although if you ask Chicago coach Joel Quenneville, this turnaround has been a long time in the making.
“I thought it was trending (the right way) since we got off to that terrible start for a number of games,” Quenneville told CSN Chicago. “We had some games where the numbers didn’t reflect that we were doing the right things.”
Part of the reason they struggled out of the gate was because they traded away Michael Frolik, who was a big part of their penalty kill last season. Marcus Kruger added that the penalty-kill units weren’t comfortable and the players didn’t trust each other initially. That’s changed as the campaign’s progressed.
Of course, the Blackhawks recent success in this category has been largely wasted due to their 1-2-3 run. They’ll try to shake off their recent slump when they face the Los Angeles Kings tonight.