Blackhawks fans in Chicago will have to wait until the team’s regular-season home opener (Oct. 6) to get their first look at Patrick Kane back at the United Center.
In a rare and somewhat strange moment of collaboration between the marketing department and coaching staff, Kane made his one and only preseason appearance Thursday in the Hawks’ 1-0 road loss in St. Louis — with “road” being the critical part.
He didn’t play in the first home preseason game Monday, and it doesn’t sound like he’ll play in the home preseason finale Saturday, either, in order to build anticipation — and potentially boost ticket prices — for the home opener.
Although the Hawks sent a mix of NHL and AHL players Thursday, fellow first-line forwards Frank Nazar and Roman Kantserov accompanied Kane to continue building chemistry before the games start counting.
Their line was the only one that generated consistent offensive chances for the Hawks. Encouragingly, the Kane-Kantserov connection seen in practice did translate into a game format. Backup goalie Arvid Soderblom was the Hawks’ best player in the game, making 35 saves.
Third periods have been the Hawks’ worst in all three preseason games so far, in which they’re 1-1-1. That will be a trend to monitor entering the regular season, although it could be attributed to their lengthy, tiring camp practices right now.
The Hawks are expected to dress a mostly NHL lineup Saturday in a rematch against the Blues.
Same old ‘PK’
The Hawks enter this season utilizing the same unique and somewhat complicated penalty-killing system that worked well for them last year, helping them finish second in the NHL in penalty-killing rate (83.6%).
The system is a hybrid between the standard “diamond” and “push-down” types. In its initial and most passive forms, it resembles a diamond, but killers are encouraged to aggressively spring outward whenever they sense an opportunity to disrupt the opposing power play.
The personnel looks significantly different, though, with Jason Dickinson and Connor Murphy now in Edmonton and Ilya Mikheyev now in Tampa.
Summer additions Cole Smith, Jordan Greenway and Ian Cole as well as rookie Anton Frondell are all expected to play penalty-killing roles, but they’re learning the system from scratch right now — which isn’t easy.
Returning killers from last year — including Alex Vlasic, Wyatt Kaiser, Ryan Greene and Frank Nazar — are helping Blashill and assistant coach Michael Peca teach it.
Sizable portions of several days of camp have been dedicated to special-teams practice, with the Hawks’ power play facing their own penalty kill.
“We’ve practiced it a lot on purpose,” Blashill said. “Because we think it’s something that [during] the early part of the year, both sides of special teams can help get you points when everybody’s five-on-five game is coming [along more slowly]. I think they’re getting where they’re comfortable.”
They got a lot of work in-game Thursday, going 0-for-5 on the power play but 7-for-7 on the penalty kill.
Injury updates
Connor Bedard continues to skate on his own with skills coaches. He has graduated this week into taking slap shots. Blashill said Bedard’s return to team practices is “obviously not forthcoming in the next little bit.”
Greenway left practice early Wednesday and didn’t participate Thursday due to a lower-body injury, which Blashill deemed day-to-day. Greenway missed tons of time the last two seasons with the Sabres due to hernia problems, so the lower-body designation is slightly worrying.