Morning Chirps: Teuvo Teravainen Heads to 4 Nations Face-off, While Other Stars Withdraw

The Chicago Blackhawks and the rest of the NHL are off for the 4 Nations Face-off in Boston and Montreal. Teuvo Teravainen will play for Finland, while the rest of his teammates are off until practice resumes on Feb. 18. They will be back in game action on Feb. 22 against the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Blackhawks Chirps

• In case you missed it in the excitement of Super Bowl Sunday, defenseman Ethan Del Mastro was reassigned to the Rockford IceHogs. This will give him a chance to keep playing during the break. It’s a bit surprising that he was the only player sent down.
• According to The Athletic’s Scott Powers, the Blackhawks aren’t “hellbent” on trading Ryan Donato. They won’t just move him for the sake of trading him. He says the team will listen to offers and only make a deal that makes sense for them. To quote The Mandalorian, “This is the way.”
• We’ll be doing a lot of history over the next few days, so I hope you like these chirps that look back. On this date in 2023, Caleb and Seth Jones scored goals in a 4-3 victory over the Arizona Coyotes.
• Happy 64^th birthday to former Blackhawks defenseman and analyst Steve Konroyd. He played 251 games in parts of four seasons in Chicago, scoring 10 goals and 57 points.

NHL Chirps

• The 4 Nations Face-off marks the return of best-on-best international hockey, well, sort of. The tournament starts on Wednesday, and Canada and Sweden will meet in Montreal. Team USA and Finland play on Thursday night. FYI, you can catch me on CHGO’s live postgame shows for all Team USA games.
• Speaking of Team USA, they will be without reigning Norris Trophy winner Quinn Hughes. Ottawa Senators defenseman Jake Sanderson will replace Hughes on the roster. Sanderson wasn’t the only Senators blueliner added to the tournament. Nikolas Matinpalo will replace Rasmus Ristolainen on Finland’s roster, as the Philadelphia Flyers defenseman has missed the last three games with an upper-body injury.
• TSN’s Darren Dreger reported that Sidney Crosby will travel to Montreal. Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet said on today’s 32 Thoughts podcast that he sees a scenario where he misses Wednesday’s game against Sweden but plays against the United States on Saturday.
• The Montreal Canadiens were one of the league’s hottest teams for a month, going 13-3-1 from mid-December to mid-January. The hot streak made many wonder if they would be buyers at the trade deadline. But they’ve gone 1-6-1 since and are falling further away from a postseason berth and will likely be sellers now. TSN’s Pierre LeBrun thinks the Canadiens will look to trade forward Jake Evans as he reports that the two sides aren’t close on a contract extension.
• A fun game, at least for the home team, took place on this date in 1993, with two players connected to the Blackhawks making an impact. The Calgary Flames beat the San Jose Sharks 13-1, with the Flames setting three league records. They scored the fastest three goals to start a period when Gary Suter, Chris Lindberg, and Ronnie Stern scored in the first 53 seconds of the third period. Jeff Reese set a record for goaltenders with three assists. Finally, Theo Fleury had a goal and five assists and finished with a new NHL record plus-9 rating.