Garbutt grinds his way to the top with Chicago Blackhawks

The grinders.

The hard-nosed, I'm-going-to-work-harder-than-you guys.

Guys who wouldn't look out of place wearing a hard hat and carrying a lunch bucket on the ice.

Every NHL roster has them and needs them to succeed.

Chicago Blackhawks fans have seen that type of mentality for four-plus seasons from Andrew Shaw, and now there's another no-nonsense player who should be catching their eye in his first season with the team:

Edmonton native Ryan Garbutt.

Acquired from Dallas along with Trevor Daley in the Patrick Sharp deal, Garbutt is slowly but surely feeling more comfortable in the Hawks' system, and he notched his first goal with the team Saturday in a 6-3 loss to Vancouver.

That it took 21 games for Garbutt to score is only fitting when one considers the long, winding path the 30-year-old winger took to make it at the sport's highest level.

"Playing against him, you notice … his speed and he's got a little bit of a chip on his shoulder," said Blackhawks general manager Stan Bowman. "He plays an aggressive, or abrasive, style. That's something that we like."

'Great for you'

Garbutt played his college hockey at Brown University, then signed on with Corpus Christi of the Central Hockey League for the 2009-10 season. After that, it was on to the Gwinnett Gladiators, the Atlanta Thrashers' ECHL affiliate.

All Garbutt did there was score 10 goals in 10 games, earning player-of-the-month honors.

That's all Gladiators coach Jeff Pyle needed to see, so he dialed up Wendell Young, the general manager of the Chicago Wolves.

Young still remembers that conversation to this day.

Said Young: "Jeff being Jeff, he's more interested in the player succeeding than his team. He said, 'Ryan's playing really, really well. It's going to be bad for me, but it's going to be great for you … if you ever need anybody.' "

Impressed by what he saw, Young signed Garbutt and watched him immediately fit in on a team that finished fourth in the AHL in goals scored and missed the playoffs by just 2 points.

"It was great. It was fun playing with a team like that," Garbutt said. "It was also a lot of veterans and guys who had played in the NHL, guys who know how to be professionals. …

"Wendell Young's been running a great program there, from the top to the bottom. It was fun to be a part of."

Garbutt racked up 19 goals, 18 assists and 118 penalty minutes in 65 games for the Wolves. The following off-season Young said he tried to get Vancouver to sign Garbutt (the Wolves went from being the Thrashers' AHL affiliate to the Canucks'), but Garbutt ended up signing a two-way deal with Dallas for the 2011-12 season.

Whatever it takes

Garbutt's signing with the Stars' organization was no fluke. According to ESPN.com, Dallas GM Joe Nieuwendyk talked with his new head coach and AHL GM in the summer of 2011, asking them to identify an AHL player with speed and passion that they thought would be a good fit for the Stars.

As it turned out, that player was Garbutt.

He spent the first 50 games of that season with the team's AHL franchise, then got called up for the Stars' final 20 games.

Garbutt was finally in the show, proving that if you bust your butt and check your ego, the NHL door eventually will swing open.

"I think what allowed me to be able to work my way up is I could play in the top six (forwards) or the bottom six," said Garbutt, whose three-year, $5.4 million contract expires after next season. "There's a lot of highly skilled players that never reach their potential because they can't play a third- or fourth-line role. It doesn't give them the opportunity to get in position to succeed offensively."

"The way he worked and skated," Young said, "there was no stopping him in going to the NHL."

Young also said Garbutt is that "glue guy" every team needs, someone who won't miss a beat on the top line but also can move down and provide much-needed energy on the third and fourth lines.

That's just the kind of player Joel Quenneville loves to coach, and it's a big reason Bowman wanted to acquire Garbutt last summer.

"He's willing to do whatever is asked of him, even if it's not the role that he would create for himself," Bowman said. "He doesn't really care. He just accepts where they put him and he does his best. It's led to good things and hopefully it will continue that way."

Character guy

Even though it took 21 games for Garbutt to find the net this season, fans who maybe aren't paying close attention should understand something: This guy can score. Garbutt piled up 17 goals for Dallas during the 2013-14 season while averaging just 13:04 of ice time.

And even when he's not scoring, Garbutt is making the most of every second he's on the ice. The stat sheet some nights almost defies logic.

• Take the Hawks' 1-0 win over Tampa Bay on Oct. 24, for example. In just 9:51 of playing time, Garbutt had 6 shots on goal and 4 hits.

• Five days later in Winnipeg: 5 shots on goal in 10:49.

• Nov. 15 vs. Calgary: 8 hits in 10:14.

• Saturday in Vancouver: 4 shots on goal in 14:09.

"He's tenacious. He's just nonstop," Young said. "Never takes a shift off."

Whether he's on the first line with Toews - as he was Saturday in Vancouver - or on the third or fourth lines grinding it out, rest assured that Garbutt's not awed that he's playing with the defending champs. Or that he's playing with Toews, Patrick Kane, Duncan Keith and Marian Hossa.

Players with that grinder mentality simply don't think that way.

No way. No how.

"Honestly, there's a lot of players I couldn't have dreamed of playing with: Shawn Horcroff, Jaromir Jagr, Ales Hemsky, Jamie Benn. It's a pretty long list for me," Garbutt said. "But I'm not really focusing on things like that right now. Probably when I'm done playing I'll look back on it and reflect on it.

"But right now I'm just enjoying every minute on the ice and in the dressing room."

Said Young: "He's a guy that put in his time. It's guys like that that weren't handed anything but now are succeeding. It's great to see."

Scouting report

Blackhawks (11-8-2) vs. San Jose Sharks (13-8-0) at SAP Center, 9 p.m. Wednesday

TV: Comcast SportsNet

Radio: WGN 720-AM

The skinny: Sharks goaltender Martin Jones was named the NHL's No. 1 star for last week. He went 3-0 with a .951 save percentage as San Jose closed out a perfect 6-0 road trip. Four of those wins came by 1 goal, and they beat Columbus 5-3 on Sunday with an empty-netter adding to the 2-goal margin. "To go on the road and rattle off those wins in the buildings we just played in, I think is a real testament to the character of our group," coach Peter DeBoer told reporters after the win over the Blue Jackets. … It has been a strange season for the Sharks, too, as they started 4-0, lost eight of 11 and then allowed just 1.83 goals per game on that road trip. … Joel Pavelski, who has a combined 78 goals the last two seasons, is San Jose's leading scorer with 12 goals and 8 assists.

Next: Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center, 4 p.m. Friday

- John Dietz