CHICAGO \u2014 The Blackhawks displayed some good things, some bad, some in between on Friday in what was essentially their last game of the preseason. They\u2019ll play with mostly an AHL roster on Saturday.<\/p>\n
But overall, there were enough positive things in a 3-2 loss to the Minnesota Wild to give Chicago a feeling that it\u2019s ready for Tuesday\u2019s season opener against the Florida Panthers.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause of the way we\u2019re coached, I think it\u2019s coming really fast,\u201d Blackhawks captain Nick Foligno said after the game. \u201cThe attention to detail of the information that we\u2019re getting, it\u2019s direct, it\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re obviously going to continue to work on things as teams make adjustments against us, but I\u2019m really encouraged by our group. I\u2019m honestly excited by what\u2019s 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\u2019ve got to get out of our game and understand we\u2019re a different team.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Blackhawks\u2019 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.<\/p>\n
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.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that\u2019s the whole thing,\u201d said Nazar, who scored four preseason goals. \u201cIt\u2019s just staying out of the box, find a way to stay level-minded even after we get scored on. \u2026 Staying out of the box and just doing our job.\u201d<\/p>\n
Blackhawks coach Jeff Blashill had his share of positives and negatives.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought our forecheck and O-zone was the best it\u2019s looked,\u201d Blashill said. \u201cThey\u2019re a pretty good breakout team, I thought that\u2019s the best it\u2019s 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.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\u2019s job to lose coming into the game.<\/p>\n
Blashill didn\u2019t tip his hand in any way.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought Gryz played good,\u201d Blashill said. \u201cHe\u2019s a solid player, he\u2019s smart, he moves the puck pretty good. He can kind of play in a lot of different situations. I thought he played pretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grzelcyk, who is on a player tryout agreement, wasn\u2019t sure where he stood going into the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot really,\u201d he said after Friday\u2019s morning skate. \u201cJust 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\u2019t really had any discussions. It\u2019s been kind of good, just worry about playing, not worry about what\u2019s 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.\u201d<\/p>\n
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.<\/p>\n
\u201c(Grzelcyk) aside, the rest of the team, we\u2019re talking about one day in the year,\u201d Blashill said. \u201cIt\u2019s not like I\u2019ve said this before, it\u2019s not like my son\u2019s bantam team, you either make it or you don\u2019t make it. This is a constant marathon through the course of the season. Some guys are going to start down and they\u2019ll have big impacts on the year like Frankie (Nazar) did at times last year. That\u2019s just the way it goes. I think more gets made about that opening roster than any other day of the year. You don\u2019t write articles about the other days moving forward. To me, it\u2019s kind of the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\u2019s available and gotten calls, they haven\u2019t been blown away by the offers and aren\u2019t just going to move him for anything.<\/p>\n
That doesn\u2019t 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.<\/p>\n
Quick hits<\/p>\n
\u2013 Blashill said again Friday he\u2019s hopeful Alex Vlasic will be available to play in the season opener on Tuesday, but it isn\u2019t definitive. Vlasic hasn\u2019t been on the ice since getting cut by a skate during a game on Sept. 30.<\/p>\n
\u201cI anticipated him to be ready, probably still do,\u201d Blashill said. \u201cHe hasn\u2019t been on the ice yet. Until we can kind of get him going there, I don\u2019t have an answer for that yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 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\u2019ll be mostly a team made up of Rockford IceHogs.<\/p>\n
\u2013 After the preseason, you can start expecting less information about the lineup and starting goalie from Blashill. There\u2019s some old-school coach in that respect.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll let you guys do the digging, hard work,\u201d Blashill said to the media.<\/p>\n
(Photo: Talia Sprague\/USA Today Network via Imagn Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO \u2014 The Blackhawks displayed some good things, some bad, some in between on Friday in what was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[4824,385,99],"class_list":["post-201952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-chicago-blackhawks","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}