Ready to bloom? Blackhawks believe they may have goalie of the future in Soderblom
Ever since Corey Crawford's tenure ended in 2019, the Blackhawks haven't had a homegrown goalie they can trust on a nightly basis.
But Jimmy Waite believes that time is coming.
Waite, the team's goalie coach since 2014, is truly looking forward to seeing how four up-and-coming netminders fare this season and how it could set the Hawks up for success for quite some time.
"It's a big year for the young goalies," Waite said of Arvid Soderblom, Drew Commesso, Jaxson Stauber and Mitchell Weeks. "We have to see how they step up. What's the order gonna be at the end of the season? That's going to be interesting."
At the top of Waite's list is the 6-foot-3, 180-pound Soderblom, who has been with the team since 2021.
Soderblom began playing goalie at age 10 and loved former Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist growing up. Over the past two seasons, he's played 71 games for the AHL's Rockford IceHogs and 18 for the Hawks.
Soderblom's NHL numbers last year (.894 save percentage, 3.45 goals-against average) look terrible on paper, but Waite and coach Luke Richardson remind us the Hawks were playing quite poorly during that stretch.
"It's hard to have good stats on a team that gave up 20 scoring chances a night," Waite said. "You might give up four goals on 24 shots, but they were four great goals and you might have stopped five or six great chances.
"So I don't like to just take stats. ... It's more than that."
Waite said Soderblom has two similar characteristics to Crawford that bode well:
• He understands how important it is to quickly move on after an opponent scores.
• He's very calm before a game.
"Sometimes I'd see Crawford before a big playoff game just standing there," Waite said, almost in awe. "It was a big game. Playoffs.
"It's like, 'OK, what's going on?' So calm. You almost get nervous. Is he ready to play?
"Arvid's like that. ... If he has a bad game, we'll look at the video and, 'OK. I could have done this better, but overall my game was OK so let's move on.' It's perfect.
"I wish I had the calmness that he or Corey had when I played."
That wasn't always the case, though. Soderblom said he did allow bad goals to affect him when he was younger. But over time he's matured and now understands few games go perfectly.
He also realizes that while what he is doing is important to a lot of people, at the end of the day it's just hockey. It's not life or death.
"You're not gonna die if you let in a bad goal," Soderblom said. "You always want to have 100% focus and be ready to have success. That's where I'm at my best. I feel relaxed and play with confidence."
Since Crawford departed, the Hawks have been cycling through goalies at a pretty rapid pace. The list includes Kevin Lankinen (69 games), Marc Andre-Fleury (45), Petr Mrazek (39), Alex Stalock (27), Collin Delia (24), Malcolm Subban (16) and Stauber (6).
The plan is for Mrazek to share the net with Soderblom for the majority of the season. The Hawks will also pay close attention to Stauber, Drew Commesso and Mitchell Weeks, all of whom will start in the minors. They also drafted Adam Gajan with the 35th overall pick in June, although he's not expected to be ready for at least 3-4 years.
So will any be like Crawford and take the reins as the Hawks' No. 1 for year to come? We obviously don't know yet, but Waite heaped some serious praise upon Soderblom near the end of our talk.
"It's hard to explain, but you can tell when a guy has the 'it' factor," Waite said. "Obviously size is important, but it's not always size. You've got a guy like (Juuse) Sarros in Nashville who is one of my favorite goalies who is 5-11 at most. He's got that 'it' factor. And I think we have one that has it (in Soderblom).
"He does everything well. Body language is very important for me. How he moves, how quick he can change direction. And just reading the game is so important for me. ...
"When to challenge, when to stay back, what the situation is on bad-angle plays. He's got all of that."