Crawford Injury Not the End of the World

photo from sports-kings.com

Twitter announced today that Chicago goalie Corey Crawford is out with a day-to-day upper body injury, confirmed by Coach Joel Quennville after teammate Patrick Sharp said he was just 'sick'.

A year ago, this would have been a problem.
When both Crawford and Nikolai Khabibulin were both out with injuries in the 2013-14 season, Antti Raanta stepped up admirably, with Kent Simpson as the token back up (he played twenty minutes of one game that season), but if Raanta had also suffered an injury (unlikely, but look at Minnesota that season), the Blackhawks would have suffered. Their goalie depth was nowhere near the kind of depth a team of this calibre should have, and it showed in their AHL affliate's season, finishing four points short of a playoff berth for the Calder cup.

However, during the offseason, Chicago added veteran backup Michael Leighton and free agent Scott Darling to the roster, two assets which have proved invaluable increasing the distinctly average depth the Blackhawks have in that position. Darling especially impressed at training camp and during the preseason. There was even speculation he might be in a position to replace Raanta as Crawford's backup to start the season (thus almost certainly giving Raanta the starter's job in Rockford, something which would potentially be more helpful in his development than another season as a backup).

Raanta hasn't played an NHL game since April 12th (a loss to Nashville in which he allowed six goals on thirty two shots). There's probably going to be some rust in his game. It's to be expected after a six month break, but the last time he was tested like this, he managed a record of 11-3-1, and I think it's fair to assume that he'll rise to the challenge again. Antti Raanta proved last season he can be a good starting goalie. This season was supposed to be about proving that he can do the job of backup equally well, it just so happens he's been tested earlier than we thought he would be.

Other News

Kris Versteeg will be making his regular season debut tonight, after being sidelined by yet another lower body injury two weeks ago. He looked impressive in training camp and the preseason, and Quennville was very vocal about how he looked like the Versteeg from before the knee surgery of last offseason. I'm hoping to see good things from where he sits on the second line with Andrew Shaw and Patrick Kane.