NEWSLETTER
Chicago (24-26-6) saw its season come to a close on Monday night with a 5-4 overtime loss to the Dallas Stars, finishing on the outside looking in at the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
This is where we expected them to be at the close of this season, not playing in the postseason and looking forward to next year, as they continue to go forward in their rebuilding process.
• While the expectation from the outside was that Chicago would not be playing in the postseason, the expectations inside the club still were on competing for a Stanley Cup. For the future cornerstones of the organization like Kirby Dach and Alex DeBrincat, not playing Stanley Cup Playoff hockey is unacceptable.
Kirby Dach on where he'd like his game to be a year from now:
"A year from now, I'd like to be in the playoffs."
— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) May 11, 2021
• DeBrincat and Dach have established themselves a future pieces of the Blackhawks core moving forward after the eventual end of the Patrick Kane-Jonathan Toews era. The focus of the rebuild will be supplementing the lineup with impact players around guys like DeBrincat and Dach, Dominik Kubalík and Brandon Hagel, Adam Boqvist and…insert some other young defenseman, maybe.
• Bowman spoke about Alex Nylander, another player who the Blackhawks were without for the entire season, and it sounds like he clearly is part of the future plans in Chicago. For next season at least.
Stan Bowman says Alex Nylander will be "fully healed and ready to go by training camp." Still sees him as a "real asset" for us moving forward.
— Mark Lazerus (@MarkLazerus) May 12, 2021
• Nylander is a restricted free agent this offseason and is coming off of knee surgery this past winter. We saw him get back on the ice back in April, so there should be no issues with him being ready for this Fall’s training camp.
• Two other players likely in the mix to join the Blackhawks next season are Henrik Borgström and Lukas Reichel. Borgström’s new contract with the Blackhawks was made official yesterday, a two-year deal at a $1M AAV. As for Reichel, we’ll see what transpires after the upcoming IIHF World Championships.
Stan Bowman says they'd like to bring Lukas Reichel over to North America. A source recently told me Reichel could sign after playing for Germany in the World Championship.
— Scott Powers (@ByScottPowers) May 12, 2021
• Speaking of the World Championships, which begin on May 21st in Riga, Latvia, the Blackhawks added three more names to the five that were confirmed yesterday heading to the tournament to represent their countries. Nicolas Beaudin and Brandon Pirri will be joining the Canadian roster, while Philipp Kurashev will be playing for Switzerland.
• A Happy 32nd Birthday to former Chicago goalie Antti Raanta!
Happy 32nd Birthday to former #Blackhawks goalie Antti Raanta! pic.twitter.com/CjI8rQaieD
— Bleacher Nation Blackhawks (@BN_Blackhawks) May 12, 2021
• And a final note before heading around the NHL, a special Blackhawks “on the day”…
THIS DATE IN 1985: Eddie Olczyk (18 years, 269 days) scores in an 8-6 @NHLBlackhawks win at Chicago Stadium to become the youngest player in the NHL’s expansion era (since 1967-68) to score a goal in either the Semifinals/Conference Finals or #StanleyCup Final. #NHLStats pic.twitter.com/oqtunAgUTr
— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) May 12, 2021
• Around the league, the New York Rangers fired their head coach David Quinn and most of his assistants today.
David Quinn has been fired by the Rangers, the team has confirmed. Assistants David Oliver, Jacques Martin and Greg Brown are out too. Goalie coach Benoit Allaire has been retained.
— Dan Rosen (@drosennhl) May 12, 2021
• The Rangers now join the Coyotes, Blue Jackets, Kraken, and Sabres as teams that will be in the market for new head coaches for the 2021-22 season.
Add Buffalo to the list of NHL teams that will start interviewing head coaching candidates, joining a list that includes Columbus, Arizona, Seattle and the New York Rangers.
— Chris Johnston (@reporterchris) May 12, 2021
• Appears Sabres interim head coach Don Granato will not be returning. Given the state of the Sabres, I’m not sure I’d want to be around that anyways.
Here's a breakdown of the Eichel/Sabres disagreement of treatment:https://t.co/INN3x5ajF5
— Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) May 12, 2021
• For teams in the Playoffs, the schedules are yet to be set, but the matchups taking shape. One that I am very much looking forward to is in the North Division between the Montreal Canadiens and Toronto Maple Leafs.
The stage is set!
For the first time since 1979, #GoHabsGo & #LeafsForever will square off in the postseason
Here are their head-to-head stats during the 2020-21 season pic.twitter.com/4Nj6sJciSg
— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) May 12, 2021
• The other at the forefront of my viewing schedule will be the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning. Not only because I became more familiar with these teams this season because of the Blackhawks, but because the non-traditional hockey market of Florida is on full display and these teams genuinely do not like each other.
Florida Men are at it again. pic.twitter.com/ZqhHQJ1tvg
— Shayna (@hayyyshayyy) May 11, 2021
• Should be electric.
• Finally, speaking of the Lightning, I didn’t want to let this moment go by without addressing it. The Lightning had three Black players – Mathieu Joseph, Gemel Smith, and Daniel Walcott – start on the same forward line on Monday. It’s not something that you see very often in hockey, where a vast majority of players are white. All-Black lines have been extremely rare in pro hockey since Herb and Ozzie Carnegie and Manny McIntyre skated on the first documented line for Sherbrooke in the Quebec Senior Hockey League in 1948-49. Back in March, we saw an all-Black line with the AHL’s Ontario Reign when Akil Thomas, Quinton Byfield, and Devante Smith-Pelly skated together.
https://twitter.com/timandfriends/status/1391944510377271299?s=20
• Representation matters. This was an awesome moment.
• That’ll do it for today. Have yourselves a good Wednesday!
