After last night’s ugly loss, Seth Jones basically said “we can’t just flip a switch, but at this point we need to” when asked about righting the ship quickly. The Blackhawks are 0-5 in the preseason and play a “home” game tonight in Milwaukee. What that roster looks like will be… a relative game-time decision. They aren’t having a morning skate on Saturday. So stay tuned.
- I’m not freaking out about the losses. Not yet.
- One line that was at least okay last night that didn’t surprise me at all was the third line of Nick Foligno, Jason Dickinson and Joey Anderson. I talked to Dickinson after the morning skate on Friday and he said he was happy to have Anderson back on his line because they’ve played so much together. Familiarity is important and they already don’t have to think about where the other two guys on the line are going. They had a decent night on Friday.
- The flip side of that argument: Teuvo Teräväinen, Connor Bedard and Tyler Bertuzzi. While I’ll agree with head coach Luke Richardson about veterans being more able to figure things out quickly, Bedard is heading into just his second season in the league — and he’s still a teenager. That line got their lunches handed to them last night.
- The Blackhawks announced three roster moves on Friday night less than one hour before puck drop. Wyatt Kaiser is on IR while Artyom Levshunov and Laurent Brossoit were both given injured non-roster designation. All three were at the game last night, which is good.
- Not driving to Milwaukee? Don’t get Chicago Sports Network yet? There are four NCAA hockey games involving five Blackhawks prospects tonight! (Note: Providence, with three Blackhawks prospects, will visit Union for an exhibition game tonight as well.)
- Scott Powers did a little homework for those folks still asking about CHSN being on Xfinity and…
- The IceHogs sent 11 players out the door on Friday. Four were sent to Indy in the ECHL and seven were released from their AHL tryout contracts. None of the names are going to give you pause, but here’s the info for those planning a road trip in the coming days/weeks.
- The Blackhawks’ opponent in the first game of the regular season — the first game in the history of the Utah franchise — named their captain on Friday. Good call.
- Former Blackhawks center Artem Anisimov announced his retirement on Instagram on Friday.
- I shared previously that Rylan Masterson, a player at Bedard’s former club in Regina who received a scholarship offer from Arizona State, claimed in a lawsuit filed in August that the NCAA’s rules blocking CHL players from playing college hockey broke antitrust laws. Well, it looks like his lawyers got someone’s attention because reports were flying on Friday night that the NCAA is going to vote on an emergency motion to punt that (stupid) rule. The NCAA meets on Tuesday and Wednesday this coming week.
- My biggest question is how this impacts player signings. If a player can play his post-draft season with a junior club like he would in the USHL and then go to college for four years (see: Sam Rinzel and Adam Gajan) that might give NHL teams a little more pause when considering signing a player immediately after the draft. It also opens the floodgates for NCAA programs to recruit unsigned drafted players. This is still something to watch carefully.
- Finally, yay for prospect rankings! People like the future of the Cubs!