Chicago Blackhawks: Erik Gustafsson has been a bright spot

The Chicago Blackhawks blueline has been much maligned this season, as their struggles have contributed to them allowing the second most goals in the NHL. However, Erik Gustafsson’s breakout season has been a pleasant surprise.

Going into this season, everyone knew the Chicago Blackhawks defense was going to be poor. They’re going through a transitional phase, but their young players aren’t really ready for big minutes yet. The Blackhawks have been awful, allowing the second most goals in the NHL as of March 6. Only the Ottawa Senators, who have played one more game than the Hawks, have allowed more.

Despite their struggles, the Blackhawks have a reason for optimism thanks to Erik Gustafsson‘s breakout season. Before this season, he was someone then-head coach Joel Quenneville didn’t trust too much. In 76 games before this season, Gustafsson had played in 76 games while posting a respectable 30 points. However, he never averaged over 18:34 of ice time per game.

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Since Quenneville has been fired, new head coach Jeremy Colliton has let Gustafsson loose. After averaging 21:20 per game under his old head coach, he has seen his ice time per game increase by over a minute under the new regime.

This is largely because Colliton has trusted Gustafsson with a lot of power play time. He went from averaging a shade over two minutes per game during power plays to averaging nearly three minutes per game on the man advantage.

Gustafsson has cemented his spot on the Blackhawks top power play unit and he’s a huge reason for them having one of the league’s leading power plays. Among defensemen with at least 100 minutes on the power play (58 of them), he ranks 14th in points per hour.

Additionally, Gustafsson isn’t just getting points because he happens to be on the ice at the same time as Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, and Alex DeBrincat. His 3.07 primary assists per hour rank eighth.

Before this season, Gustafsson had 30 points. This season, he already has 47 points in 63 games. Simply put, Gustafsson has more assists this season (35) than he had total points before this season (30).

You can’t measure a defenseman exclusively by their production. Gustafsson’s doing great work without the puck as well. He has a positive relative Corsi For percentage, Goals For percentage, and Scoring Chances For percentage.

It took Gustafsson a while to stick with the Blackhawks. And his renaissance couldn’t have happened at a better time. The Blackhawks are in a transitional period, switching from a defense led by Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook to a younger one. Gustafsson should be a key part of this period, as he’s proven he can gobble up minutes and produce at a very respectable rate.

He has one year left on his deal after this one. At this point, Gustafsson’s $1.2 million cap hit is easily one of the biggest bargains in the NHL if you exclude entry-level contracts. He’s 26 years old and should have a number of productive years ahead of him. If Gustafsson keeps this up, he should be one of the most sought after free agents after the 2019-20 season.