PREVIEW: Blackhawks Open Home-and-Home with Wild Friday Night

TIME: 7:30 p.m. CT
TV: NBCSCH+ | RADIO: WGN 720 AM | STREAM:
MyTeamsApp
(In Market) &
ESPN+
(Out of Market)
The Blackhawks and Wild open a home-and-home set on Friday night with the first meeting of the season at the United Center, completing the back-to-back on Saturday night in St. Paul, Minn.

TEAM RECORDS

• CHI: 15-18-6, 36 PTS
• MIN: 22-10-3, 47 PTS

HOW TO WATCH

Can't make it to the United Center? Pat Foley and Eddie Olczyk have the call tonight on NBC Sports Chicago+ with pregame coverage beginning at 7 p.m. John Wiedeman and Nick Olczyk have the radio broadcast of the game on WGN Radio as well.

VS. MINNESOTA

The Blackhawks and Wild match up for the first time this season, opening a home-and-home set at the United Center. It's the first of three meetings in 12-day span, three of four meetings overall on the year.
The teams last met on Feb. 4, 2020 when Minnesota came out on top with a 3-2 victory in overtime. Erik Gustafsson and Kirby Dach tallied helpers in the game. Gustafsson has notched a point (2G, 4A) in four consecutive games against the Wild. Patrick Kane has five multi-point outings, including two-three point games, vs. Minnesota over his last 12 games against the club. Prior to being held scoreless vs. Minnesota on Feb. 4, 2020, Jonathan Toews posted five straight multi-point games vs. the Wild.
Chicago has registered a point (4-0-2) in six straight games against the Wild.

FIVE UNBEATEN

With Monday's shootout loss to the Kraken, the Blackhawks saw their season-long four-game win streak come to an end, but they extended their point streak to a season-best five games. During this five-game run, Chicago has not yielded more than two goals in a single contest. Over the course of the point streak, Marc-Andre Fleury is 4-0-1 with a .956 save percentage, 1.37 goals-against average and one shutout.

SCORING STREAKS

Patrick Kane registered a helper on Monday to extend his season-long point streak (2G, 8A) to eight games, matching Seth Jones for the longest such run by a Blackhawks player this season. Jones recorded a career-long eight-game point streak (2G, 6A) from Nov. 1-20. The eight-game run shares the longest by a defenseman in the NHL this season.
Dominik Kubalik recorded a goal and an assist on Monday to reach 100 career points. In the process, he extended his goal streak to three games, matching Alex DeBrincat and Brandon Hagel for the longest streaks by a Chicago skater this year.

BLOCK CITY

The Blackhawks are the only team in the league with three players in the top-10 in blocked shots per 60 minutes -- Connor Murphy is fifth, Jake McCabe is sixth and Calvin de Haan is seventh (min. 25 games).
de Haan paced the Blackhawks in hits and blocked shots for the second consecutive game on Saturday. de Haan matched a career high with seven hits on Jan. 4 against the Avalanche. His 24 hits since Jan. 1 share 12th and his 26 blocks are second in the league over that stretch. The Carp, Ontario native matched a season high with six blocked shots on Thursday night (Oct. 13 at COL). He has 21 blocks over his last four games and is seventh in the league averaging 6.71 blocks per 60 minutes (min. 25 games).
Murphy paced the club with six blocked shots on Jan. 8 against the Golden Knights. He had a season-high seven blocks on Jan. 1 in Nashville.. He paces the NHL with 29 blocked shots since Jan. 1. The Dublin, Ohio native is third in the NHL with 92 blocked shots during the 2021-22 campaig. Murphy finished third in the league with 123 blocks last season and was 10th in that category during the 2019-20 campaign.
Chicago is fifth in the league averaging 15.13 blocks per 60.