The Chicago Blackhawks’ seesaw season continued with a 4-2 loss to the St. Louis Blues on Sunday, and at least one Hawk is ready to walk the plank.

“We’re just one win, one loss, one win, one loss — it’s a frustrating road to be on,” Nick Foligno said, referring to the loss following Friday’s 4-3 upset of the Toronto Maple Leafs in overtime. “But we have to understand why we’re in it.”

[ [Don’t miss] Column: Veteran Nick Foligno offers some uncomfortable truths about the Blackhawks’ struggles ]

“We can’t just be like, ‘Agh, OK, we’ll get the next one.’ Well, we’re (19) games in now, a quarter of the way through the season. … You have to understand, in order to have success, what it is, otherwise you’re being ignorant at this point. So we’re going to keep working on it, but there’s got to be a commitment from everybody.”

With Sunday’s setback, the Hawks have gone 19 games into the start of a season without consecutive wins, breaking a tie to claim ninth place in franchise history.

Unlike a lot of coaching staffs, the Hawks aren’t under pressure to make the playoffs.

Just develop the Connor Bedards and Kevin Korchinskis of the team, and if nothing else is accomplished, at least build up one thing: consistency.

This is the textbook definition of inconsistency.

That message was probably seared into skaters’ ears during a players-only meeting after the game.

Ryan Donato said, “I’m sure you can look at a lot of what (Foligno’s) saying, but he talked again and it’s just not good enough. …

“It’s tough the way everything happened tonight; we’ve just got to make sure we show up every night. The difference can’t be us not showing up.”

Practically every game and every practice, the Hawks talk about being ready for puck drop, but that was far from the case in the first period.

The Blues scored two goals in the first 5 1/2 minutes, by Jake Neighbours and Kevin Hayes, and got a late power-play goal by Pavel Buchnevich.

Donato scored his fourth goal of the season, saving the first frame from being a disaster.

The Hawks bounced back in the second period and fought the Blues to a scoreless stalemate, and they opened the third with some premium looks that they failed to punch in.

But the Blues responded with their own push and Neighbours potted his second goal.

Boris Katchouk scored his first goal of the season with a minute left in the game.

“It was a little frustrating,” coach Luke Richardson said. “We just weren’t alert or kind of aware tonight and not a physical effort. We pushed back in the second again and you’re always under duress when you’re behind and trying to catch up.

“But I don’t know why, I just think they were the hungrier team tonight and we let them be, so that’s frustrating to see because I thought we wanted to try and take that excitement from last game and put it into tonight, and we just didn’t do that.”

Here are four takeaways.

Yes, they did, and badly.

Robert Thomas’ no-look seam pass to Buchnevich was as deadly as any in the NBA.

After he looked Neighbours’ way down the right half wall, Alex Vlasic changed stick position to that side, Arvid Söderblom committed to the shot coming from his glove side and Connor Murphy turned his body toward that wall, leaving Buchnevich open to deposit the puck back door.

It was a bang-bang play, and Murphy and Söderblom reacted a second too late.

Richardson said, “I think Murph should be a little looser on that, too, on the back side. He really doesn’t have anybody, I think he can be out just a step further.

“You can always say everybody can do a little bit more on that, but even if you roll it back about 20 seconds, it’s in the corner, we’re not tight in the battle. … (Katchouk) could’ve been in there a little tighter and Vlasic on the bottom side, and we let them out of that, and then you scramble and there’s going to be seams, and that’s what happened on that one.”

It would seem unlikely, as much as has been made about his speed, but Neighbours outran Korchinski to the net on his backhand breakaway goal to open the scoring.

Perhaps it was more about Korchinski taking a second to react to the Hawks suddenly losing the offensive zone.

In the third, Korchinski was retrieving the puck by the end wall when Buchnevich swiped it from him and served up a low-to-high pass to Neighbors who one-timed it past Söderblom from point-blank range.

Richardson said, “Right before (Korchinski) got to the puck, it was kind of rolling, going slow, it just got to right at the edge of the boards and you see his head kind of turn to look what he was going to do next and I don’t know if it hit a snowbank and then stopped but he kind of overskated it.

“He didn’t really even mishandle it, he just missed it, and then they made a quick play.

“Things just didn’t go Kevin’s way tonight but he had a great finish last game and he’s a young guy, he’s got to bounce back last game,” Richardson said.

Bedard is not the most demonstrative person — unless the mood suddenly strikes him, such as during a celly.

Chicago Tribune Sports

Weekdays

A daily sports newsletter delivered to your inbox for your morning commute.

Don’t expect him to suddenly become Knute Rockne on ice

“He’s one of those guys, he demands the puck by his actions,” Richardson said. “He was really humming there in overtime (Friday against the Toronto Maple Leafs) and that’s what we expect and love to see out of him.

“But when he takes charge and starts skating and gives it a little tap of the stick … the guys see it. So it’s just as good as vocally yelling for it, and not alerting the other team sometimes as well, and getting that puck on the fly.

“His style of communication isn’t the rah-rah, yell and scream. I think he’s very in control, he’s very alert and aware out there.”

[ [Don’t miss] Corey Perry will be away from the Chicago Blackhawks for the foreseeable future, GM Kyle Davidson says ]

His smallish size makes him a target, but he can give as good as he gets.

“We’ve seen it in practice this year,” Richardson said. “He and (Wyatt) Kaiser went at it in a little bit of a battle drill, but they’re their best friends after it’s over.

As for games, “I’ve noticed him getting in there in the skirmishes, and I told him just get in there and have your stick up, then people will stop coming around you and (you’ll) protect yourself,” Richardson said. “He gets in there when his teammates need him, and that’s a good sign.”