Hawks' Opening Night roster almost looks set originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago
Not only is the Blackhawks' Opening Night roster for the 2022-23 season starting to take shape, but it actually looks very close to being set.
On Tuesday, the Blackhawks assigned forwards David Gust, Cole Guttman, Mike Hardman, Kale Howard, Lukas Reichel, Michal Teply and Josiah Slavin and defensemen Jakub Galvas and Isaak Phillips to the Rockford IceHogs of the American Hockey League and also placed forwards Luke Philp, Brett Seney and Dylan Sikura and defenseman Nicolas Beaudin on waivers.
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That essentially puts the training camp roster at 29 players:
Forwards (16):
- Andreas Athanasiou
- Colin Blackwell
- Colton Dach
- Max Domi
- MacKenzie Entwistle
- Reese Johnson
- Tyler Johnson
- Patrick Kane
- Boris Katchouk
- Jujhar Khaira
- Philipp Kurashev
- Sam Lafferty
- Paul Ludwinski
- Taylor Raddysh
- Buddy Robinson
- Jonathan Toews
Defensemen (10):
- Jack Johnson
- Caleb Jones
- Seth Jones
- Jake McCabe
- Ian Mitchell
- Connor Murphy
- Alec Regula
- Filip Roos
- Riley Stillman
- Alex Vlasic
Goaltenders (3):
- Petr Mrazek
- Alex Stalock
- Mitchell Weeks
The Blackhawks need to make at least six more cuts to get to the 23-man limit, and it appears some of those decisions might already be made for them:
- Katchouk (left ankle sprain), McCabe (cervical spine surgery) and Mitchell (left wrist) will likely start the season on injured reserve, which would put the current active roster at 26 players.
- Dach and Ludwinski are still hanging around, but that's probably because they missed the start of training camp with injuries and the Blackhawks want to give them a fair opportunity to practice and/or play in a preseason game. I wouldn't expect either to make the team.
- The same goes for Weeks, who signed an AHL contract with Rockford over the summer and is serving as the third goaltender right now. A nice reward for him and developmental opportunity to absorb as much experience as possible with the NHL team before he's sent back to the minors.
There are really only a few injury questions that need to be answered before the official roster is finalized:
- Caleb Jones (shoulder), Khaira (right ankle) and Murphy (back tightness) are all listed as day to day, and that's most likely why the Blackhawks are keeping around Regula and Roos on the back end for the time being.
Other than that, the lineup looks pretty clear. Let the line combinations and defense pairing predictions begin.
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