Blackhawks defenders Matt Grzelcyk and Artyom Levshunov will not play again this season due to their respective upper-body injury and hand fracture, head coach Jeff Blashill told reporters Tuesday (including Ben Pope of the Chicago Sun-Times).
Grzelcyk, 32, hasn’t played since March 22 against the Flames and has already missed the Hawks’ last four games. He left quite early in that contest, potentially the last of his Blackhawks tenure.
Despite coming off a career-high 40 points with the Penguins last season, Grzelcyk didn’t land a guaranteed deal for this year until agreeing to a $1MM pact with Chicago on Oct. 5. Coming to the Blackhawks off a professional tryout, he ends his 2025-26 campaign with just 12 assists and a -9 rating in 69 games. His ice time average was way down at 16:58 per game, his lowest since his rookie year with the Bruins back in 2017-18.
Those numbers don’t tell the whole story, though. No Blackhawks defenseman has been stronger in the puck possession department this season than Grzelcyk. His 46.9% Corsi share and 45.7% expected goals share don’t look intriguing at face value, but sit first and second on the team at 5-on-5, respectively, per Natural Stat Trick, and the only defender with a better xGF% is Connor Murphy, who was shipped to the Oilers before the trade deadline. Grzelcyk did start 54.6% of his shifts in the offensive zone – definitely some advantageous deployment.
With even more young Hawks defenders pushing for full-time roles next season, namely Ethan Del Mastro and Kevin Korchinski, it’s hard to see a reunion happening. Grzelcyk is likely ticketed for his third trip through unrestricted free agency in as many years.
Levshunov, though, will almost definitely be back in a Blackhawks uniform next season, barring a blockbuster deal. The 2024 second overall pick is coming off his first full season of NHL hockey. The results weren’t spectacular. His growing pains were quite reminiscent of Korchinki’s rushed rookie season back in 2023-24, although he did look far more comfortable offensively than his older counterpart.
After sustaining the hand fracture last Friday against the Rangers, Levshunov’s year ends with 22 assists and 24 points in 68 games with a -41 rating that could end up as a league-worst. Averaging 19:35 of ice time per game, that rating came despite Levshunov being their most sheltered defenseman at 5-on-5 with a 65.5% offensive zone start rate.
Some of that can be attributed to goaltending. No Blackhawks defenseman received less support behind him this year than Levshunov, who ends up with a .895 on-ice save percentage at 5-on-5 with a .976 PDO. Still, his possession numbers were downright ugly considering the sheltering he received, and he’ll end his season with only 11 power-play points despite anchoring the top unit.
There’s certainly some more growth needed before he’s ready to sniff top-four minutes again, at least if Chicago has designs on contending for a playoff spot next season. Whether they’ll be aggressive in trying to acquire some higher-quality veteran stopgaps than they have in years past or just let their kids ride out their growing pains remains to be seen.
The Blackhawks are sitting on 27 wins as another disappointing season winds down, Over the last five seasons, Not including the current campaign the club has averaged 25.2 wins per season, It’s time to hire a coach that teaches winning, And, Not how to play the game, Kyle Davidson continues to stockpile draft picks which is safe, And, Gives him job security, It’s time for a new GM, It’s time to declare the rebuild is over, And, Start competing again.
Blashill has done a more than credible job with a roster of 20 year olds and it would be dumb to make another switch. Richardson was a mistake and Davidson is doing a great job piling up assets. So whatever team you root for give them your bad advice and leave the Hawks alone. They’re doing fine. It’s only year 3 of what is usually a 5 year rebuild at least. And there’s more coming and they should finally be able to either sign some high end defensemen or at least trade for a couple. It should be a pivotal off season but the people running it are just fine.
The rebuild actually started July 7, 2022 when they traded DeBrincat and Dach right before the draft so it’s almost 4 years now. It’s not over, but it shouldn’t be going on for more than another 2 years.
The coach is an improvement over the prior ones, but the GM isn’t much better than Bowman. It’s easier to manage a salary cap when you have young players on ELCs as opposed to having established star players on expensive contracts.
Go back even further to the Hagel trade in March of 2022. This trade still churns my stomach. Hopefully Moore and Boisvert have Hawks careers that make it worthwhile. Bowman left behind a huge mess. Jury still out on KD. I’m not a big KD fan.
I, also am starting to wonder about KD. Piling up assets isn’t winning games, and unless some kind of magic happens this summer, there’s absolutely no reason to be optimistic about next year. The Hawks defense is soft, if KD is serious about moving this team forward, he’ll draft big defense men in the upcoming draft….lot’s of ’em.
I’d post another reply but the censor for the Hockey site is a 16 year old teen female Catholic virgin who has never been allowed out of her basement.
NOTE TO PHR CREW:
Could we stick to hockey and avoid the personal, bigoted attacks.
This isn’t the first time this guy has made mean attacks on a comment he doesn’t agree with. Let’s stick to talking hockey.
If you saw what I posted it was neither bigoted or personal towards you. And it was about hockey. In fact I’m sending a copy of it to the owner. The basketball site can let a bunch of religious freaks go on for hours about religion but what I posted is censored. I’d post it again but well……
OK I’ll try again. Maybe the daytime censor is an adult.
Why? Because he didn’t go out and throw around a bunch of stupid money at any Tom, Dick or Harry that came along? Look he made offers to the big time FA’s but the Hawks weren’t far enough along to get one to bite so he kept it in his pants and is waiting for the right guys. At some point if they still don’t want to come he’s going to have to start making deals to get what he wants. Those will define how good or bad his legacy will be. But I think people are starting to notice what’s here and Agents and Players alike will start looking at the money and the team as a whole. They have a solid #1 Goalie, Some good young players that just are starting to show out. They need a little experience, A B/U Goalie whether from within or not and maybe a 40 goal guy to pair with Frondell and Bedard who already have hit it off from what I can see. I had my doubts about Gajan but he looked pretty good in the frozen 4 and I don’t know if he’s coming or not this year or going back to school but he’s looking better. There’s a lot going on and a lot to like. I like it.
I guess not
^^^ regarding the above, folks: most of the time, if your comment is moderated, it’s not me or the team doing it. There are several keywords that will automatically put your comment in moderation and it will sit there until one of us sees it to approve it. @Unclemike, that D name is one of the words that will get your comment automatically shifted into moderation
What D word would that be? I’m 70. The term Tom , D and Harry was around 100 years before me. It’s a name not a noun. Maybe the censor should learn the English language. Wow. But thanks.
As for tucsontoro you come on every Hawks article just to throw shade so the next time you do it I’ll be reporting you. If you come onto sites to antagonize people don’t be a whiner when it comes back your way. That’s what 12 year olds do.
With all due respect, would you point to one comment I’ve made where I
“throw shade?”
I will stand behind every comment I’ve made as being non-bigoted, or hateful, compared to some people around here.