The Chicago Blackhawks fired coach Luke Richardson on Thursday, showing their frustration with the progress of the team’s rebuilding effort.
Chicago has lost four straight games, bringing their record to a league-worst 8-16-2 for the season. They were outscored 41-27 during a 3-9-1 stretch over their last 13 games.
Anders Sorensen, who had been coaching the team’s minor league affiliate in Rockford, was promoted to interim head coach.
“Today I made the difficult decision to move on from Luke as our head coach,” general manager Kyle Davidson said in a statement. “We thank him for his efforts and contributions to the organization and our community.
As we have begun to take steps forward in our rebuilding process, we felt that the results did not match our expectations for a higher level of execution this season and ultimately came to the decision that a change was necessary.”
The Blackhawks had hoped to be more competitive in Richardson’s third season. They signed players like Tyler Bertuzzi, Teuvo Teravainen, Alec Martinez, and Craig Smith on the first day of free agency this summer. They also had Connor Bedard returning for his second season after winning the Calder Memorial Trophy as NHL rookie of the year.
However, Bertuzzi and Teravainen have struggled, and Martinez has been hurt. Bertuzzi has five goals and five assists in 26 games, while Teravainen has only three goals and two assists in his last 21 games.
The most important player for Chicago is 19-year-old Bedard. His lack of production may have contributed to Richardson’s firing. Bedard, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 draft, has shown some positive development but has had a hard time scoring.
He ended a 12-game goal drought with a score against Dallas on Nov. 27. He has five goals and 14 assists in 26 games, compared to 11 goals and 10 assists at the same point last season.
“We’re not happy with the record, for sure,” Richardson said after his last game, a 4-2 loss to Boston on Wednesday. “The guys are trying to work within the system and the right way and unfortunately, like I said before, we don’t seem to have one kind of Achilles’ heel.
There’s not one problem with our team. It’s like one night there’s one area — maybe our defense or our forward or one player — and the next night it’s another area, like a different player.”
While Chicago has had many issues, their biggest problem has been offense. They are averaging 2.42 goals per game, ranking 31st in the NHL, ahead of only Nashville. Last season, the Blackhawks finished with the fewest goals in the league, with 178.
Richardson, 55, had a 57-118-15 record in Chicago. He was a former NHL defenseman and had been an assistant coach with Montreal before being hired by the Blackhawks in June 2022. In the 2021 playoffs, he briefly took over as coach for Montreal when Dominique Ducharme tested positive for COVID-19 and helped lead the Canadiens to their first Stanley Cup Final since 1993.
This change comes just ahead of the Winter Classic on Dec. 31, where Chicago will face the St. Louis Blues at Wrigley Field. Before the coaching change was announced, the NHL released a design of how the rink will look at the home of baseball’s Chicago Cubs.
Sorensen, 49, is a familiar face for the Blackhawks. He first joined the organization as a development coach in 2013. He has a 117-89-16-7 record in 229 career AHL games, all with Rockford.
