College Highlights, Eyes on Waivers, Injuries Impacting Deadline Decisions, and Other Blackhawks Bullets
If you’re around a radio at 10:30 AM CT today, I’ll be on NHL Network Radio on Sirius/XM with the crew from The Fourth Period at 10:30 AM CT to talk about the Blackhawks. Will today be more of the same holding pattern or will we get some resolution soon on some of the deals that sound like they’re brewing?
- There’s a pretty good chance we have more updates coming later today for the trade buzz around a number of Blackhawks players, so keep an eye out for those. It was a quiet night last night. The Blackhawks practice at 1:30 PM CT today so we’ll know who is and, more importantly, isn’t available at practice then.
- I’m going to wake us up on Saturday with a couple highlights from last night’s Notre Dame vs. Michigan game in the Big Ten. Here’s a nice clip of Frank Nazar picking up the second assist on a goal. Nazar makes a good chip in the neutral zone to set up the 2-on-1.
- From the same game, Notre Dame’s Landon Slaggert scored a pretty goal as well. Slaggert is definitely one of the college players the Blackhawks might be speaking with about turning pro in the coming weeks.
- The San Jose Sharks will retire Patrick Marleau’s number. We don’t know yet if another Patrick whose number will be retired will be on the ice for the game. But we do know that the Blackhawks and Sharks facing off tonight will have a direct impact on the Bad for Bedard Sweepstakes standings.
- Here are the new numbers for the three guys joining Rockford and David Gust in Chicago:
- Unfortunately for Gust, it appears he might have to wait a couple more days to make his NHL debut. The Blackhawks have back-to-back games in Anaheim and Arizona on Monday and Tuesday. But you never know when a roster spot might become available… (wink).
- The Pittsburgh Penguins placed forward Kasperi Kapanen on waivers on Friday. There were some rumors that they wanted to dump him (see the Nikita Zaitsev trade the Blackhawks made earlier this week) but apparently they weren’t willing to pay the price in picks to get his $3.2 million cap hit (through next season) off their books.
- No, I don’t think he’s worth $3.2 million and why would the Blackhawks pick him off waivers and do Pittsburgh that favor for free when they could have traded for him and added other assets previously?
- This is a really tough blow for the Winnipeg Jets and might influence what they do in the next six days before the trade deadline. Perfetti, 21, was the tenth overall pick in the 2020 NHL Draft and has 30 points in 51 games in the NHL this season.
- I want to be cautious with how I say this because I firmly side with any and every player that makes the choice to step away from his/her occupation to take care of themselves. So noting the timing of this news regarding Panthers goaltender Spencer Knight isn’t ideal for the team feels very cheap and selfish from a fan’s perspective, and I fully acknowledge that. My hope is Knight can get the help he needs and can return to the ice at some point down the road. But the Panthers may now need to address their goaltending situation before the deadline.
- Finally, the Bulls did the thing last night. Finally. Now if only they could play like that most nights…
