The Chicago Blackhawks are five points back of the San Jose Sharks from the final wildcard spot in the Western Conference, and despite the gap between the teams, they are in very similar spots in their rebuild.
The Blackhawks might be seen as a little behind the Sharks because of where they stand just past the half way point in the season, but the Blackhawks were missing two of their top forwards for a chunk of time and are still in the race. San Jose was missing Will Smith, but it's not the same as missing Macklin Celebrini and Smith at the same time like was the case with the Blackhawks and playing without Connor Bedard and Frank Nazar for an extended period of time.
While many will say Celebrini is better than Bedard, both are elite at a very young age and are the cornerstones of their teams. Each have proven to have other top young players that will stick around, such as Nazar, Oliver Moore, Artyom Levshunov, Ryan Greene, Nick Lardis, and more top picks and good prospects on the team and in the system. The Sharks have Smith, William Eklund, Collin Graf, Sam Dickinson, Michael Misa, Igor Chernyshov, and more too.
The Blackhawks have the better goalie at this time though as Spencer Knight has been excellent on this sub-.500 team. Yaroslav Askarov is good, but has more work to do to be at the same level.
The Sharks went into this season with worse forward depth, but did more in the summer to add. They also just acquired Kiefer Sherwood in a move to get better, something the Blackhawks didn't do much of in the offseason and haven't done this season.
While the teams are being built similarly, both should be good soon enough. But it will take some more time for each to really reach that top level as the young groups develop with the right moves made around them. San Jose is more aggressive, while Chicago has been more reserved. If the Blackhawks want to hang with the Sharks, a little more aggression will be needed.
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