Blackhawks prospect Colton Dach suffered an injury in Game 1 of the 2022 Tom Kurvers Prospect Showcase against the Minnesota Wild on Friday at Fifth Third Arena and did not return.
Nothing appeared to be abnormal on Dach’s final shift of the first period, but he did not come out for the second period and the Blackhawks were forced to play the rest of the game without their top-line left winger.
Rockford IceHogs head coach Anders Sorensen said he “wasn’t sure” about the nature of the injury, but a source told NBC Sports Chicago that Dach’s injury is upper-body related.
“We’ll know more tomorrow,” Sorensen said of Dach, who scored the opening goal just 23 seconds into the game. “He’s been evaluated right now. I couldn’t really tell, he came off and that’s all the report I got. But it did happen in the first, yeah.”
The Blackhawks also had another scare when top prospect Lukas Reichel left early in the second period after taking a hit along the boards by Wild forward Adam Beckman, who was penalized for boarding on the play. Reichel returned for the third period and finished the game.
This isn’t the first time Chicago’s prospects have been hit with the injury bug in a prospect game against Minnesota. Four Blackhawks prospects were injured in the finale of the Traverse City Prospect Tournament in 2019, which included Adam Boqvist and Kirby Dach. Very freakish.
The Blackhawks were in complete control of Friday’s contest prior to the injuries to Dach and Reichel, holding a 2-0 lead and outshooting the Wild by more than double for the majority of it.
The pendulum swung the other way after the Reichel injury, and the Blackhawks eventually lost thanks to five unanswered goals by the Wild and a terrific performance by 2021 first-round pick Jesper Wallstedt, who stopped 35 of 37 shots for a save percentage of .946.
“I thought we were playing well there,” Sorensen said. “And then we lost [Reichel] and obviously Dach and we get a power play and two of the guys on the power play disappear. We lost some momentum, for sure. We had to go three centers for a little bit and got out of sorts, but we’ve got to be better in those situations.”
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