Why Blackhawks' young defense reminds Duncan Keith of his early years

In retrospect, young Blackhawks defenseman Wyatt Kaiser's performance against the Ducks in March 2025 marked a turning point in his career.

His dominant showing ended Kaiser's nearly two years of bouncing between the NHL and AHL and established him as an important piece of the defensive corps the Hawks are assembling.

It turns out another important person happened to be watching that night: Legendary Hawks defenseman Duncan Keith.

Keith said Friday he isn't able to watch as many Hawks games as he would like, since they're often finished by the time he gets home from coaching his son Colton's youth-hockey team in British Columbia.

But he still follows the Hawks closely, and when they're on the West Coast, he is often able to watch.

That particular Hawks-Ducks game fell in that category. Keith took notice of Kaiser's quick footwork to dart around two Ducks at the blue line, skate into space and snipe the game's opening goal. It reminded him vaguely of himself.

"I got to meet [Kaiser] when we were here in January," Keith said. "He looked bigger on the ice, so I hope I looked that big when I was playing. He moves really good. He's a good-skating defenseman."

In fact, this entire Hawks defense vaguely reminds Keith of the crew he joined in his first NHL seasons. That only came after he spent two full seasons in the AHL, which is another fact worth remembering when judging prospects.

Keith is obviously remembered for his enormous contributions to the Hawks' dynasty era, which earned him induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame in November and now induction into the new Blackhawks Hall of Fame. Keith, Steve Larmer, Troy Murray and the nine Hawks with already retired numbers were honored privately Friday and will be honored again Saturday at the United Center.

But it's easy to forget the Hawks went 26-43-13 in 2005-06 — Keith and Brent Seabrook's rookie year — and 31-42-9 in 2006-07. Those teams struggled mightily.

That firsthand experience gives Keith optimism that this ultra-young Hawks team will eventually find its way and learn how to succeed. It also gives him patience when analyzing the process from afar.

"They've got a great young group of defensemen," Keith said. "You look at the size of some of these guys and the way they can skate and how young they are. [Artyom] Levshunov is, what, 20 years old?

"It's going to take a few years to get that experience and that internal competition to push one another for each other for ice time. I see a lot of similarities with our young group that we had when I started out on this team.

"Everyone pushed one another to become better, and slowly you're able to add some players. We added [Marian Hossa]. Hopefully they get to a point where they can, here in Chicago, add a piece like that."

That last comment is one that general manager Kyle Davidson should notice. It's a sentiment being brought up more and more by relevant people, and it will be up to him to make happen this summer.

The rebuild's fate will ultimately be decided by how this existing core pans out, though, and Keith knows that well. He witnessed the same team that won 26 games in 2005-06 end up winning 52 games and a Stanley Cup four years later.

"It was just [about] the work ethic every day to get better and improve," he said. "Before you knew it, we started adding more players, the players that we had here kept getting better and the snowball got bigger and bigger. It's just [about] staying focused on getting better and improving.

"Certainly, Connor [Bedard] has shown improvement in his game and that drive and motivation [to] be a good leader for this group. But it's going to take everyone to step up."