CHICAGO — The Blackhawks displayed some good things, some bad, some in between on Friday in what was essentially their last game of the preseason. They’ll play with mostly an AHL roster on Saturday.
But overall, there were enough positive things in a 3-2 loss to the Minnesota Wild to give Chicago a feeling that it’s ready for Tuesday’s season opener against the Florida Panthers.
“Because of the way we’re coached, I think it’s coming really fast,” Blackhawks captain Nick Foligno said after the game. “The attention to detail of the information that we’re getting, it’s direct, it’s purposeful and it allows us to attain it as fast as possible. I saw that even in our games, just how much better we got throughout the periods. Even our third periods seem to be our best periods a lot of nights. Guys know what they need to do and have adapted well to that.
“We’re obviously going to continue to work on things as teams make adjustments against us, but I’m really encouraged by our group. I’m honestly excited by what’s to come here at the start of the season. We just have to learn that we have to be the team that was like that in the first period, not the team that beats itself. Those are old habits we’ve got to get out of our game and understand we’re a different team.”
The Blackhawks’ five-on-five play was probably the most encouraging part of their game Friday. Chicago outscored Minnesota 2-0 in five-on-five play, which included goals by Foligno and Frank Nazar, and pretty much played even hockey with the Wild from a possession standpoint at five-on-five.
Where Minnesota beat them was in special teams. The Wild capitalized on three of their four power plays and the Blackhawks failed to score on their three chances. The Wild scored all three of their goals during a penalty-filled second period, which had just 8:50 of five-on-five play.
“I think that’s the whole thing,” said Nazar, who scored four preseason goals. “It’s just staying out of the box, find a way to stay level-minded even after we get scored on. … Staying out of the box and just doing our job.”
Blackhawks coach Jeff Blashill had his share of positives and negatives.
“I thought our forecheck and O-zone was the best it’s looked,” Blashill said. “They’re a pretty good breakout team, I thought that’s the best it’s looked. There are still some areas in (the) D-zone we need to shore up, a couple of teaching things. A big one is you have to do a better job of either breaking out clean or being stronger on some of our plays. There are times to punt, sometimes we roll and when we do that we have to make sure we get pucks out. I just thought we left too many pucks in their zone so you get in a little bit of scramble mode.”
The Blackhawks are expected to make their final roster decisions over the next day. The main roster battle probably comes down to a left-handed defenseman. It was probably Matt Grzelcyk’s job to lose coming into the game.
Blashill didn’t tip his hand in any way.
“I thought Gryz played good,” Blashill said. “He’s a solid player, he’s smart, he moves the puck pretty good. He can kind of play in a lot of different situations. I thought he played pretty good.”
Grzelcyk, who is on a player tryout agreement, wasn’t sure where he stood going into the game.
“Not really,” he said after Friday’s morning skate. “Just prepared to play maybe two games this weekend. Let the chips fall where they may. Control what I can control, just go out there and focus on having a good game tonight and see what happens. I haven’t really had any discussions. It’s been kind of good, just worry about playing, not worry about what’s going on outside that. I think this summer was obviously pretty stressful, just trying to treat it as your normal camp and put a good effort forward and see what happens.”
If Grzelcyk is offered a contract, that likely means Nolan Allan and Ethan Del Mastro are sent to the Rockford IceHogs to start the season. Blashill did mention after the game that he thought too much was made of the season-opening roster.
“(Grzelcyk) aside, the rest of the team, we’re talking about one day in the year,” Blashill said. “It’s not like I’ve said this before, it’s not like my son’s bantam team, you either make it or you don’t make it. This is a constant marathon through the course of the season. Some guys are going to start down and they’ll have big impacts on the year like Frankie (Nazar) did at times last year. That’s just the way it goes. I think more gets made about that opening roster than any other day of the year. You don’t write articles about the other days moving forward. To me, it’s kind of the same thing.”
If I had to bet right now, I would say Lukas Reichel is still with the Blackhawks at the official start of the regular season. While the Blackhawks have told teams he’s available and gotten calls, they haven’t been blown away by the offers and aren’t just going to move him for anything.
That doesn’t mean Reichel will be seeing the ice when the season starts. He probably begins the year as the 13th forward and has to wait for his chance. The Blackhawks firmly believe he needs to play in a top-six role, and it might not be until one opens up that he gets his next chance.
Quick hits
– Blashill said again Friday he’s hopeful Alex Vlasic will be available to play in the season opener on Tuesday, but it isn’t definitive. Vlasic hasn’t been on the ice since getting cut by a skate during a game on Sept. 30.
“I anticipated him to be ready, probably still do,” Blashill said. “He hasn’t been on the ice yet. Until we can kind of get him going there, I don’t have an answer for that yet.”
– The Blackhawks will wrap up their preseason schedule against the Blues on Saturday. A few players who played on Friday are expected to be included in that lineup, but it’ll be mostly a team made up of Rockford IceHogs.
– After the preseason, you can start expecting less information about the lineup and starting goalie from Blashill. There’s some old-school coach in that respect.
“I’ll let you guys do the digging, hard work,” Blashill said to the media.
(Photo: Talia Sprague/USA Today Network via Imagn Images)