The Chicago Blackhawks’ final game before the Olympic break went about as poorly as it possibly could have. Not only did the Blackhawks get shut out for the fourth time this season, falling 4-0 to the Columbus Blue Jackets for their sixth loss in the last seven games, but two staples of the lineup exited early due to injury and did not return.
Wyatt Kaiser had his left leg fold awkwardly after being fallen on by Zach Werenski, while Colton Dach appeared to get hurt during a board battle with Erik Gudbranson. That put the Blackhawks down one forward and one defenseman for most of Wednesday’s game, where Columbus cruised to a seventh straight victory.
Between the two, Kaiser’s injury appeared more serious, as he couldn’t put much weight on his left leg and was helped off the ice by his teammates. The way in which his leg folded after Werenski’s weight came crashing down did not look good.
After the game, head coach Jeff Blashill made it seem like Kaiser had avoided the worst-case scenario, which is positive news. However, Blashill did admit that the 23-year-old blue-liner will likely miss some time, but the full extent of the injury won’t be known until the coming days.
“Kaiser will be out for a little bit. I don’t want to [give] an exact timeline. We’ll know more after he gets examined tomorrow. We’ll see after the break.”
For Dach, it appears that he suffered a minor injury early in the second period while duking it out down low with Gudbranson, a physical defensive defenseman for the Blue Jackets. Blashill had a more promising update on Dach’s status, as he should be fine with a 22-day break ahead.
“If we were playing tomorrow, Dach wouldn’t play,” Blashill said after the game. “But he’d be [ruled] day-to-day.”
After being asked about Kaiser and Dach, Blashill also received a question about rookie Ryan Greene, who was questionably scratched for the first time this season on Wednesday. He had played in the Blackhawks’ opening 56 games.
Despite several veterans being in the midst of major slumps, such as Teuvo Teravainen and Andre Burakovsky, Greene was the one yanked from the lineup in favor of captain Nick Foligno. Blashill said there are things in Greene’s game that they wanted to clean up, even though it feels like many others deserved the demotion more than he did.
“Greene has played good hockey for us, and he’s going to play good hockey again for us. He’s a good player. There are a couple of things we want him to correct. It gives him a chance to have urgency and make sure he’s making the corrections he needs to. He’ll get back out there when the break is over.”
To be fair, Greene had amassed a minus-eight rating in his last five games coming into Wednesday, which is one of his worst defensive stretches of the season. Still, it feels like he received a slightly unfair punishment, considering he’s been far from Chicago’s biggest issue lately.
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