There was some huge sports news in Chicago on Friday. Before the Chicago Blackhawks took a tough loss to the Minnesota Wild, head coach Luke Richardson announced that Laurent Brossoit had a clean-up knee procedure and will likely miss another six weeks.
Blackhawks say goalie Laurent Brossoit had a follow-up arthroscopic surgery on his right knee and will be re-evaluated in six weeks.
— Tracey Myers (@Tramyers_NHL) November 29, 2024
Brossoit had an elite year as the backup for the Winnipeg Jets last year and came to Chicago to help them stabilize their goaltending while the young team develops.
Unfortunately, because of these injury troubles, he has yet to play in the regular season. Thankfully, Petr Mrazek and Arvid Soderblom have done a wonderful job in tandem this year.
Mrazek is 7-9-1 with a 2.66 GAA and a .911 save percentage. The Hawks don’t score a lot which is the reason for his record but his other stats are excellent. Mrazek has started most of the games for Chicago.
As his backup, Soderblom has turned the corner as an NHL goalie. His record is 1-4-1 with a .236 GAA and a .926 save percentage. Again, his record is terrible because of his team’s lack of scoring but his numbers show he should continue getting chances.
This news about Brossoit impacts the Blackhawks more than just missing a good goalie for another six weeks. There are business implications as well.
Soderblom now has 56 games played in the NHL. Once he crosses the 60 games played mark, he will no longer be waiver-exempt. That means a decision will have to be made on what to do once Brossoit comes back (assuming Soderblom plays four times before then).
Honestly, it may be time to forget about Soderblom playing in the AHL. He, although in a somewhat small sample size, has been great in the NHL. He needs to continue getting reps at the highest level.
Based on how he’s played so far with those sparkling stats, you’d assume that Soderblom would get claimed quickly if he were put on waivers.
They also don’t know how long Brossoit is going to last once he comes back. They never want to be in a situation where they are down to one or zero goalies. Goaltending has been a strength of the Hawks during a tough quarter of the season.
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