As the Olympics begin, it gives us two weeks to look back at the first 61 games of the season. The standings in the Central Division are updated through the beginning of the break already.

Below are the full team stats for the Blackhawks to date.

Legend: PIM = Penalty Minutes, ATOI = Avg Time on Ice, PPG/A = Power Play Goals/Assists, SHG/S = Shorthanded Goals/Assists, GWG = Game Winning Goals, FO% = Faceoff Win Pct, BS = Blocked Shots.

Legend: SO = Shutouts, TSA = Total Shots Against

Before Sunday’s game against Columbus, the Blackhawks made two roster moves.

After Marian Hossa went down on Saturday night, the Hawks needed to add a body to the roster. To accomplish this, Jake Dowell was recalled from Rockford, officially, on Sunday morning.Veteran center John Madden, who has missed a couple games with a lower body injury, was placed in the injured reserve as well.

Whether or not Madden’s move to the IR should be cause for concern won’t be known until after the Olympics in March; the Hawks more likely moved Madden there as a financial move. The salary cap is a tricky thing, and the Hawks are close enough to it that they have been conservative with call-ups all season to save money.

Hossa’s status has not yet been formally updated.

Now that the ink is dry and the Blackhawks have locked up more of their young core to long term deals, there will continue to be a lot of dialogue surrounding which current Hawks players won’t be on the 2010-11 roster. Somehow, GM Stan Bowman avoided tagging issues to get the deals with Jonathan Toews, Duncan Keith and Patrick Kane done, but that doesn’t change the reality that the Hawks need to cut payroll off their roster for next year.

In the first discussion of a developing series, we’ve recruited Michael Wagner, a Blackhawks’ Featured Columnist on Bleacher Report, to help evaluate the trade candidacy of Tomas Kopecky, while we looked at Dustin Byfuglien’s status with the Hawks’ organization.

Dustin Byfuglien

Now that the Have have cleared whatever tagging hurdles there were in the way of signing Keith, Toews and Kane, the immediate need to move a player has disappeared. Just because it isn’t present doesn’t mean it’s dead. The Hawks still need to move a player (or two, or three).

Tomas Kopecky isn’t playing well so far this year, and he was a healthy scratch from the lineup on Saturday night in Pittsburgh. With his minimal exposure, Kopecky might be a veteran another team might bite one.

Personally, I doubt it. He’s played so poorly, my opinion is that Kopecky’s more likely to be bought out next summer. By buying Kopecky out, his cap number would drop from $1.2 million to $360,000, a nearly $900,000 savings that could be the difference between keeping and trading someone like Patrick Sharp.

One player that has a higher value in the trade market right now because he’s statistically performing is Dustin Byfuglien.

Byfuglien is a big body (6-3, 245) who was brought through the Hawks’ system as a defenseman. But because of the emergence of players like Cam Barker and Niklas Hjalmarsson, and the Hawks’ desperate need for a big body to consistently post up in front of opposing goalies, Byfuglien was moved to forward.

This move came while former Hawks’ GM was making the first of a number of mistakes with veteran contracts. Before the 2008-09 season, based completely on the perception of a huge ceiling, Tallon gave Byfuglien a three-year, $9 million contract.

When the ink dried, only five Hawks had a bigger cap number than Byfuglien’s $3 million.

Byfuglien bounced around a little last year before landing on a line with Dave Bolland and Patrick Kane that proved to be special in last year’s playoffs. Though his production went down (from 36 points in 67 games during 2007-08 to 31 points in 77 games in 2008-09), Byfuglien was a much more balanced performer on the ice. He went from a minus-seven to plus-seven in the same one-year stretch.

One of the big factors in Byfuglien’s statistical drop-off was his playing time, and when he was playing. In 2007-08, Byfuglien had 17 points on the power play (seven goals, 10 assists) and was playing over 17 minutes per night. In 2008-09, he had only seven power play points (three goals, four assists), and his numbers dropped under 15 minutes per game.

Because Byfuglien was playing the blue line primarily, he was at the point on the power play more often in 2007-08 than the following year. This season, Joel Quenneville has experimented with Byfuglien back at the point on the power play with some success.

Something else developed in 2008-09: the Blackhawks were a good, deep roster with a fairly well stocked farm system.

In 2007-08, the Hawks spent the year fighting to come up with enough points to sneak into the playoffs; their “one goal” back then was to be relevant. In 2008-09, they sprinted to the Conference Finals. Byfuglien played a big role in the Hawks’ postseason success, too.

But the value Byfuglien brings to the team, and how his salary effects the payroll in relation to that production, are why Byfuglien might be the most attractive, yet most easily replaced, piece on the current roster.

Through Saturday night’s win in Pittsburgh, Byfuglien has 10 points (eight goals, two assists). His eight goals are tied for second on the team, just one behind Kane’s team leading nine. So, on paper, he’s a productive big man.

But, as is true with all sports, staring a numbers don’t always translate to reality in games. Byfuglien is far from the top of the Hawks’ roster when it comes to quality on the ice.

Despite his 10 points, and the amount of time he’s on a line with players like Kris Versteeg and Sharp, or Kane and Bolland, Byfuglien hasn’t been a consistent performer. He’s minus-five on the season, making him one of only three Hawks that average over 10 minutes on the ice per night that are negative (John Madden is minus-two, Kopecky is minus-seven).

Byfuglien has also shown a tendency to take less-than ideal penalties this year. It really began for Byfuglien on Oct. 21, after Toews went down against Vancouver. Byfuglien decided to come to his captain’s defense minutes after the hit, and took a dumb penalty that resulted in a critical goal for the Canucks.

Again, on Friday night, Byfuglien took a questionable boarding penalty that cost the team. After that penalty, his role appeared to change in the eyes of Quenneville.

Byfuglien slid from the second line, where he had been skating with Kane and Versteeg, to the third line with Madden and Ladd; Troy Brouwer was elevated to the top line with Marian Hossa and Toews, while Patrick Sharp played with kane and Versteeg.

As the lines were set for Saturday, Byfuglien was with Madden and Brouwer, while Andrew Ladd skated with the first line. Byfuglien’s role was sliding down the depth chart.

It hasn’t been only the penalties he’s been taking that have hurt Byfuglien’s playing time, either. After Hossa joined the team, and with Brouwer playing exceptionally well (13 points), there are other players on the roster that are posting up in front of the net just as well.

Indeed, Brouwer’s solid season, and price tag that comes at one-third that of Byfuglien, might be one of the most important factors in his importance on the team disappearing. Brouwer handles the puck better than Byfuglien, most noticeable in his six assists to Byfuglien’s two, and has also taken only 16 penalty minutes to Byfuglien’s 40, all while being credited with nearly as many hits (69) and Byfuglien (83).

Add to Brouwer’s smarter, less expensive play the reality that the Hawks have good players with similar size to Byfuglien coming along through their system, and Byfuglien’s time in Chicago could be over sooner than later.

We’ve already seen Bryan Bickell and Jake Dowell play effective hockey with the Hawks this year, and they could be with the big team in Chicago for less than $1 million next year. Also available will be better offensive players in Akim Aliu and Kyle Beach, both of whom are having good seasons and are years younger than Byfuglien.

In fact, as Mr. Wagner will be the first to testify, I might be the cheerleading President of the Beach Fan Club on Bleacher Report; I’ve been writing about his potential since early this past summer.

Beach is 6-3 and over 210 pounds, both comparable to Byfuglien’s size, but Beach won’t turn 20 until the middle of January. In 25 games in Spokane this year, Beach has 21 goals and nine assists (30 points) to go with 78 penalty minutes.

Beach could easily replace Byfuglien, Ben Eager and/or Andrew Ladd next year; in my opinion, Beach will be on the 2010-11 Blackhawks, the only question is who he’ll replace. It could, and should, be Byfuglien.

There are General Managers like Toronto’s Brian Burke that love big, banging forwards like Byfuglien. Unfortunately for team’s looking to dump salary on the Leafs, they don’t have draft picks to move in return; they traded most of their high picks for Phil Kessel and are trying to stockpile picks via trade now.

The Blackhawks would want to move Byfuglien in a deal that would unload most, if not all, of his $3 million cap number. That means either a prospect or draft picks coming back. However, if the Hawks could pick up a contributing player for a relatively low cap number, perhaps a young defenseman for under $1 million with an expiring contract, that might get the deal done.

Another possibility is that Hawks GM Stan Bowman packages a couple younger players in a deal to bring in a contributing player that’s less expensive. In the coming days, Wagner and I will look at a few more players that could be on their way out of Chicago. Packaging Byfuglien with someone like Cam Barker, who also has a cap number of $3 million, could be tempting for lots of rival GMs.

Tomas Kopecky

Entering the 2009-2010 season many, including myself , thought that Tomas Kopecky could be an X-factor for the Chicago Blackhawks after a strong training camp and preseason.

Who could blame us Hawks fans for being interested about Kopecky as in the offseason he was signed to a two year, $2.4 million deal? So ‘Hawks management had to believe that there was some talent there.

Well, it seems as though they might have been wrong.

Kopecky has not played well in the Hawks system only recording three points and a minus-7 rating in 27 games and was a healthy scratch for the first time this season against the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Now the likely reason that Kopecky was in the press box tonight was just to send a message to the slumping forward but it is also possible that this could be something more.

With the Hawks recent signings of their big three rumors have begun to swirl about who might be in and who might be out.

Most of the names involved in possible trade talks have been the likes of big money players such as Dustin Byfuglien, Kris Versteeg, and Cam Barker but every little bit counts and Kopecky is a movable commodity. 

Kopecky might be struggling now but he could still be a valuable player for a team that lacks depth and his ability to play multiple positions is another valuable asset to a team looking for a checking forward.

If Kopecky were to be dealt there would be multiple options to replace him on the 3rd/4th line such as Jacob Dowell, Bryan Bickell, or even Jack Skille.

In the short time that Dowell, Bickell, and Skille were with the Blackhawks they combined for as many points as Kopecky with three and as a group were a plus-1 in 13 games.

So basically whoever the Hawks were to replace Kopecky with would likely be an upgrade and would be a lot less money. 

Now the benching of Kopecky could be much ado about nothing but if his slump continues I can guarantee you that he will be seeking employment elsewhere in 2010.

The Kopecky portion of this article was originally published on Bleacher Report by Michael Wagner. For the original article, go here.

Is All Star center Peter Forsberg on his way back to the NHL?

A number of sources are reporting that 36-year old center Peter Forsberg, currently playing with Team Sweden in the Karjala Cup, is trying to make a comeback to the NHL. Reports are that he’s as healthy as he’s been in at least three years, and is skating well enough to draw interest from a number of NHL clubs.

Among the teams that reportedly have scouts watching Forsberg are a couple of his former teams, the Philadelphia Flyers and Colorado Avalanche, as well as the Montreal Canadiens, Washington Capitals, Detroit Red Wings and Chicago Blackhawks.

Perhaps the hottest rumor surrounds the Red Wings, who are playing without two of their top three centers because of injury. Johan Franzen is out for most of the season with a torn ACL, and Valterri Filppula is expected to miss up to eight weeks with a broken wrist. 

The Blackhawks potentially scouting another center raises at least my eye brows for a number of reasons. When healthy, the Blackhawks have three solid centers in captain Jonathan Toews, Dave Bolland and John Madden. Whether or not Forsberg, who has scored 885 points in 706 career NHL games, would want to return as a third or fourth line center is questionable.

But my eyebrows stay in an upright position considering the health of the Hawks centers. Toews has now been out over two weeks with concussion-like symptoms, and Bolland has been dealing with a bad back for the entire season. The Hawks are currently playing well, but have been mixing up their centers on the third and fourth lines every night because of injuries. Andrew Ebbett, Colin Fraser, Tomas Kopecky and Jake Dowell have all spent time in the faceoff circle, and even Jordan Hendry has been asked to play forward because of the injuries.

How, when, and where Forsberg returns to the NHL will be interesting. If it’s in Chicago or Detroit, the balance of power in the Central Division could shift with his arrival.

When the Blackhawks get healthy, who will disappear from the team photo?

It’s always unfortunate when injuries strike a roster, and the Hawks have certainly been more fortunate than some of their Western Conference rivals like Vancouver and Detroit. Chicago hasn’t been immune to the ijnjury bug, but that hasn’t kept them from accomplishing one of their goals – beginning November in first place.

Now that November has started, the return of injured players is expected to begin as well. Brent Seabrook came back on Thursday night last week and was a noticeable influence on the flow of the defense in both Thursday and Friday’s games. Seabrook, of course, isn’t the only key player to be missing from the regular Blackhawks rotation.

Forward Ben Eager has been out since the first week of October with what appears to be post-concussion symptoms. The team, and the fans, had great expecations for an enegetic fourth line of Eager, Colin Fraser and Adam Burish this year, but Burish went down with a torn ACL in the preseason and Eager has only played in two regular season games. 

From watching the Hawks over the last couple weeks, it’s been clear that Eager’s physical presence has been missed. According to reports over the weekend, Quenneville and Eager both indicated that Eager’s head appears to be back where it belongs (he no longer thinks he’s Batman), and now it’s just a matter of him getting his legs back to full speed before the Hawks put him into a game.

Eager’s an important player in the Hawks’ lineup, but certainly doesn’t carry the cache of a name like Jonathan Toews or Marian Hossa. Hossa hasn’t stepped into a game for the Hawks yet because of summer shoulder surgery, but there’s no questioning his status as an elite scorer. The Hawks offense has been above average to start the year (2.92 goals per game, 15th in the NHL), and adding Hossa to the mix undoubtedly brings another fear factor to playing Chicago.

The loss of Toews, and the duration of his absence, has been troublesome, though. The Hawks’ 21-year old captain took a nasty shot from Vancouver’s Willie Mitchell on October 21 and hasn’t skated with the team since. In fact, it now appears that Eager is closer to returning that Toews; if Toews misses the same four weeks Eager did because of his concussion, the Hawks will continue to experiment with lines and hope for results.

Toews’ presence has been obvious on the stat sheet. With their captain in the lineup, the Blackhawks averaged 3.75 goals per game, and Toews was winning over 60 percent of his faceoffs. Without Toews, the Blackhawks are averaging just 2.00 goals per game, their power play has disappeared, and they’re breaking even in the faceoff circle.

Playing without Seabrook, Eager, Hossa and Toews has allowed coach Joel Quenneville to play with his lines like a fantasy hockey team, mixing up the talented players he has available to find a winning combination. It’s also presented a golden opportunity to youngsters like Jack Skille and Jake Dowell to get quality ice time with the big club. Even Jordan Hendry got time as a forward in Nashville.

But what happens when Eager, Toews and Hossa return?

When Toews was healthy, Quenneville appeared to be a big fan of a second line of Dave Bolland between Dustin Byfuglien and Patrick Kane. In Toews’ absence, he’s stuck with Byfuglien and Kane being together, but has placed John Madden between them more often.

On the third and fourth lines, the wing and center situation has been mixed up pretty regularly in Toews’ absence. The team acquired Andrew Ebbett from Anaheim, a younger player with the ability to play both wing and center, and he’s played both positions in the last few games. In fact, he played center between Kris Versteeg and Andrew Ladd in Nashville.

Andrew Ebbett

Depending on who returns first between Eager and Toews, it appears the first decision will come down to either Ebbett or Fraser.

On paper, it would appear that Ebbett has been more productive and, based on ice time, has more of Quenneville’s confidence than Fraser. But that’s where statistics fall short of telling the story.

First, let’s not discount the fact that Fraser played well between Eager and Burish last year. When Eager returns, Quenneville might believe he can recapture the Energy Line’s effectiveness from last year by putting Eager and Fraser back together. In that case, it would be up to Tomas Kopecky or Ebbett to complete the line by trying to replace Burish.

Colin Fraser

Secondly, Fraser has been more involved in the Hawks penalty killing unit in Toews’ absence. that isn’t going to help any player accumulate points or have a solid +/- rating, so there needs to be some concession in the argument in favor of Fraser there.

Finally, Fraser has been center that has suffered from the revolving door between Chicago, Rockford and the injured reserve. He’s played next to Skille, Dowell, Kopecky, Ebbett and Hendry to name a few of the rotations Quenneville has tried recently.

Fraser, though, was apparently the final player to make the Hawks roster when Quenneville put the final roster together for the season; he won a stiff competition with Dowell for the fourth center position. Ebbett has a lot of skill, versatility, and upside, but Fraser is a known commodity.

In Ebbett’s favor, the Blackhawks are about to play a long stretch of games against faster West Coast teams, and Ebbett’s quicker on his skates than Fraser. His speed, and familiarity with teams like Phoenix, Los Angeles and Anaheim from his time on the Ducks’ roster, might make him a valuable asset in the coming weeks.

Either way, Quenneville has an interesting decision coming up.

As far as production on the ice, I would have to think Hendry is on the short list to leave town as well. Quenneville playing him at forward was as much a salary cap-related decision because of depth and financial concerns as it was because of Hendry’s ability to play the position; Hendry only played five minutes on Thursday and wasn’t effective in the minutes he was on the ice.

But, given Seabrook’s recent return from injury, odds are that Quenneville will keep a seventh defenseman around for depth.

It appears Hossa could be ready to return in just a couple weeks, perhaps in time for Jeremy Roenick Heritage Night on the 15th against San Jose, and Toews hopefully won’t be out much longer. The Blackhawks are off until Thursday this week, giving the roster time to get healthy before they play again.

When Hossa and Toews return, both exceptional two-way forwards, that could easily cost Hendry his position on the roster.

How Quenneville will align the talent he has when this exceptional roster is at 100 percent is another discussion completely, but which young player is on the move as these three veterans begin returning could be interesting over the next couple weeks.

Cristobal Huet played exceptionally well in goal but took the loss on Thursday night.

I guess if you play the same team three times in 15 days, they have a pretty good chance to figure out an effective game plan.

The Blackhawks and Predators faced off in Nashville in their third game against one another already this season, and Nashville was finally able to put together a winning formula. In fact, the Predators thoroughly dominated the Blackhawks in every part of the game.

On what appeared to be mediocre ice in Music City, the Hawks never got their act together and they squandered a fantastic effort from Cristobal Huet. Bouncing pucks, sloppy skating and bad penalties plagued the Hawks, who weren’t able to take advantage of the few opportunities they were afforded by the Preds.

Pekka Rinne was marvelous, earning a well-deserved shut out against a team that had scored three goals against him on October 15. The Blackhawks only put 22 shots on net, well below their season average, and did not display the shoot-and-follow offense that has been so effective for them to start the year. Rinne didn’t allow many rebounds, and when there were loose pucks the Hawks didn’t capitalize.

Nashville topped the Blackhawks in every statistical category except two: faceoff wins and penalty minutes. They out shot the Hawks 28-22, out hit the Hawks 21-15, and had 11 takeaways to the Blackhawks’ 6 on the night.

The Hawks’ 24 penalty minutes did include a 10-minute misconduct penalty on Dustin Byfuglien with just four seconds left, taken after it appeared a Predator interfered with Patrick Kane’s stick as he attempted a one-timer in front of the net. The Hawks on the ice collectively lost their composure and argued with officials as Jerred Smithson took the puck the other direction for a short-handed empty net goal.

Apparently Byfuglien’s language was a bit more colorful than the other Hawks on the ice, as he earned both the 10-minutes misconduct and a four-minute unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.

The effort from Huet was consistent with his last three outings, though. He made big saves in tough situations from every angle and looked every bit the $5 million goalie the Hawks hoped they had signed last summer. Over his last three games, Huet has allowed two goals on 75 shots.

The Hawks have had small breakdowns in each of the last three games on the ice between players that aren’t used to playing with each other. The offense was noticeably off it’s game on Thursday, playing without captain Jonathan Toews for a third consecutive game.

As coach Joel Quenneville tries to put the pieces together in Toews’ absence, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Toews means more than his five points indicates on paper to this team. The Hawks’ power play, which was the best road power play in the league coming in (5-13) has struggled to find continuity, and the rotation of available centers has barely broken even in faceoffs.

Toews has been among the best centers in the league in the faceoff circle this year, and is among the best two-way centers in hockey. His value to the team runs deeper than his offensive game, and his absence was painfully obvious on Thursday.

Because of games on back-to-back nights, and the return of Brent Seabrook from a concussion, Quenneville decided to skate Jordan Hendry at forward rather than recall Jake Dowell again from Rockford. The fourth line of Tomas Kopecky, Colin Fraser and Hendry was pretty bad on Thursday, and Hendry only skated a little over five minutes.

Nashville has now won three of their last four, with the one loss being in Chicago last week. Rinne has been in goal for all three of the wins, with Dan Ellis taking the loss in Chicago.

Friday night, the Hawks welcome Montreal to the United Center with red-hot goaltender Jaroslav Halak  . The Canadiens had won four in a row before losing 6-1 in Pittsburgh on Wednesday night, and Halak has been in goal for each of their last five contests. The Canadiens (6-6-0) comes in allowing the same goals per game as Nashville (3.18), but are scoring more than half a goal per game (2.50-1.91) more than the Predators.

The Hawks will have their work cut out for them as they try to end a solid first month of the season on a high note at home.

Jake Dowell dropped the gloves with Minnesota's Shane Hnidy in the first period Monday.

After a miserable game against Dallas, Chicago coach Joel Quenneville put his goalie on notice that his poor play wasn’t good enough, especially with Antti Niemi playing well behind him. Cristobal Huet’s coach wasn’t the only person questioning his abilities; it seemed that all 20,000 fans in their seats wanted to tell Huet how well he was playing.

Maybe some healthy competition is doing the Blackhawks some good.

In his last two starts, Huet has stopped 47 of the 48 shots he’s faced and has picked up two much-needed wins against teams the Blackhawks needed to beat.

Both Nashville and Minnesota came to the United Center playing bad hockey, and neither improved their standing against the Hawks. Despite Chicago being without two of their better players, captain Jonathan Toews and defender Brent Seabrook, the Hawks were able to play sound defense in front of Huet and generate enough offense to win both games.

Monday night’s game was impressive on a number of fronts, one of which was not the Hawks’ composure. The Blackhawks drew seven penalties in the game, many of which were easily avoidable.

The dumbest penalty of the night was drawn by Cam Barker in the third period, who’s play continues to confuse and frustrate fans. At 14:54 in the third, Benoit Pouliot was hit with a penalty. After play was stopped, though, Barker took a shot at Pouliot and was called for a worthless interference penalty. The Hawks and Wild would skate four-on-four instead of having an advantage. It was Barker’s second penalty of the night.

Despite the Hawks taking so many penalties, there was a lot to take away from this game that was positive. Troy Brouwer scored his third goal of the season on a Hawks power play in the first to extend the Hawks to a 2-0 lead on a great put back off a shot by Tomas Kopecky.

Brouwer isn’t the cover boy that Toews, Patrick Kane, Brian Campbell or Kris Versteeg have become, but his play early this season has been exceptional. In every part of the game, Brouwer has been a solid player, and his stats are starting to reflect hs abilities.

The first goal of the night was scored by Dave Bolland, and the third was a ridiculous shot by Patrick Kane. Kane circled out from behind the net and found a gap about the size of a postcard in the top left corner of the net.

Another great effort was from the Hawks penalty killing units. The Hawks killed six penalties on Monday night, and received solid contributions from the entire active roster on the kill.

The defense was a strong theme throughout the final two periods of the game for the Blackhawks. The Wild were credited with 11 shots in the first, and only ten in the final two periods. Niklas Hjalmarsson had an especially solid game, covering Campbell’s tail on a couple occassions after he got worked by a couple Wild.

One of the Wild players that made a number of solid moves early in the game to avoid a pressing Hawks defender was returning favorite son, Martin Havlat. Havlat was a non-factor in the game, ending up at -2 on the night and only getting one shot on net.

But the win circles back to the goal, where Huet again played like the guy the Hawks gave a $5.6 million salary to before last season. Even though the two wins have come at the expense of two of the worst teams in the NHL, it doesn’t take away from the numbers.

In his post game interviews, Huet appeared to be more confident in himself and Quenneville appeared to be happy as well.

Jake Dowell is bouncing back and forth between Rockford and Chicago.

For the first couple weeks of the season, it was Jack Skille burning up the roads between Rockford and Chicago. Now, it looks like Jake Dowell has become the in between man.

Because of the Blackhawks’ salary cap situation, the Hawks have been running a shuttle between their minor league affiliate in Rockford and the United Center between games all season. Dowell, who made his first appearance of the season for the Hawks on Saturday night, was temporarily demoted for Sunday, but was recalled on Monday morning for the Hawks game against the Minnesota Wild.

Dowell, who played with Adam Burish at the University of Wisconsin, was the final roster cut before the season started. Coach Joel Quenneville opted to keep Colin Fraser over Dowell when the rosters were set to begin the season, but now both will see playing time together on the fourth line.

Because of the injury to Toews, still listed as an “upper body” issue, Dowell bring more versatility to the roster. His natural position is center, but he played wing exclusively on Saturday night. Andrew Ebbett played center in place of Toews, and both Dowell and Tomas Kopecky can play center as well.

On defense, Seabrook’s “upper body injury” is a concussion, suffered when he got kicked in the head in last Wednesday’s loss to Vancouver. Ben Eager is already missing from action with concussion-related issues, and hasn’t played since being placed on injured reserve October 8.

The decision on Toews and Seabrook’s eligibility for Monday night’s game has not yet been determined. Minnesota has struggled this season and is dealing with injuries, and the Hawks don’t play again until Thursday night in Nashville. Because the Hawks’ schedule isn’t necessarily loaded with top-tier opponents, saving Toews and Seabrook’s health for another few days might be the best option for the rest of the season.

UPDATE (5:05 pm CST) – Per Twitter, Quenneville has decided that both Seabrook and Toews are OUT vs. Minnesota tonight, and are still considered day-to-day.

Brian Campbell will play next to Duncan Keith in the absence of Brent Seabook Saturday night.

The Blackhawks will have to skate against last-place Nashville on Saturday night without two of their best players, captain Jonathan Toews and Brent Seabrook.

To accomodate the absence of Toews, the forwards will be lined up as follows:

Dustin Byfuglien - John Madden - Patrick Kane

Andrew Ladd – Dave Bolland – Kris Versteeg

Patrick Sharp - Andrew Ebbett - Troy Brouwer

Tomas Kopecky – Colin Fraser – Jake Dowell

With Seabrook not available, coach Joel Quenneville will start the defenders paired as follows:

Duncan Keith – Brent Sopel

Niklas Hjalmarsson - Brian Campbell

Cam Barker - Jordan Hendry

With Cristobal Huet in goal, the losses of Seabrook and Toews will test the young Hawks. Thankfully, Nashville is struggling as much as any team in the league.

POSTGAME UPDATE:

The only line that appeared to have any continuity on the ice on Saturday night was that of Madden, Byfuglien and Kane. Kane literally skated circles around the Predators on a number of occassions, and Byfuglien scored the first goal of the game; it ended up the game winning tally.

Ebbett played well in the circle and skated well with Sharp and Brouwer, but the line wasn’t able to get into the scoring column. They did, however, not take any cheap, stupid penalties in the game.

Huet played well in net, but didn’t get much help from his defense. The Blackhawks allowed 21 shots in the first two periods.

The Blackhawks will not play either captain Jonathan Toews or Brent Seabrook on Saturday night against Nashville, according to the team. Both are listed as having “upper body injuries” after hits in Wednesday’s game against Vancouver.

One roster move was made on Saturday morning to accomodate the two scratches. Center Jake Dowell was recalled from Rockford. Newcomer Andrew Ebbett or Tomas Kopecky could both play center on Saturday to fill Toews’ spot, and Dowell, 24, could see ice time as well. 

To cover for Seabrook, the Hawks will benefit from getting Jordan Hendry his first ice time of the season on Wednesday, as he will now have to dress with Brent Sopel. Sopel was a healthy scratch on Wednesday.