Morning Chirps: Knight up for postseason award, prospect heading back to college

The Chicago Blackhawks are back on home ice tonight. They will play the final four games of the 2025-26 at the United Center, starting with the Carolina Hurricanes. We’ll have your full game preview later this morning and plenty of analysis after the game ends.

Blackhawks Chirps

• Speaking of the Hurricanes, they recalled four players from the Chicago Wolves yesterday, so they might be looking to rest a few players tonight. The Blackhawks will hold an optional morning skate today, and the Hurricanes won’t skate at all, so we won’t know the lineups until pregame warmups.

• The Professional Hockey Writers Association named its 32 nominees for the 2026 Bill Masterton Trophy. Goaltender Spencer Knight is the Blackhawks nominee, being just three years removed from entering the player assistance program for help managing his obsessive-compulsive disorder. Former Blackhawks Taylor Hall (Carolina Hurricanes), Laurent Brossoit (San Jose Sharks), Kevin Kankinen (Vancouver Canucks), and Jonathan Toews (Winnipeg Jets) were also nominated.

• The Athletic’s Scott Wheeler put the Blackhawks on top of his NHL prospect pool rankings. His evaluation of the organizational depth that Kyle Davidson has built is well worth the read. He has the Blackhawks on top, even without considering Artyom Levshunov a prospect anymore.

• According to Scott Powers, 2024 third-round draft pick John Mustard will return to Providence College for his junior season. He has 17 goals and 29 points in 36 games for the Friars this past season.

• The Brantford Bulldogs opened up their second-round series by thrashing the North Bay Battalion 8-1. Marek Vanacker had three primary assists, including one on the game-winning goal. Parker Holmes, the Blackhawks’ 2025 fourth-round pick, returned to the lineup after missing the first round. Game 2 of this best-of-seven series will be on Friday.

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• On this date in 1931, Cy Wentworth scored at 13:50 of the third overtime to beat the Montreal Canadiens 3-2 in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final. This remained the longest game in Stanley Cup Final history until the Edmonton Oilers and Boston Bruins played 55:13 of overtime in the opening game of the 1990 Final.

• In 1972, the Blackhawks completed their four-game sweep of the Pittsburgh Penguins with a 6-5 overtime win. Pit Martin’s goal 12 seconds into extra time was the fastest overtime goal in Stanley Cup Playoffs history. In regulation, Bobby Hull netted the final postseason hat trick of his career.

• In 1983, Al Secord set a team playoff record by racking up 37 penalty minutes during a 2-1 victory against the St. Louis Blues. After earning a minor for elbowing in the first period, he was slapped with 35 penalty minutes in a wild second frame. He picked up a fighting major, two game misconducts, and a 10-minute misconduct at the 12:05 mark.

• Blackhawks Birthday Roll Call, April 9: Wayne Hicks, Milan Bartovic, and Ryan Donato.

NHL Chirps

• In case you missed them yesterday, Jeff Maroon dropped in to give us weekly NHL Power Rankings.

• The Seattle Kraken held a playoff spot for much of the season, but completely collapsed after the Olympic break. On Wednesday, the team announced that Ron Francis will be stepping down from his role as President of Hockey Operations. A native of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, you can bet Francis will be a candidate to be the next general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs.

• The Boston Bruins signed their 2025 first-round pick, James Hagans, to his entry-level contract. He was originally signed to an amateur tryout contract with the Providence Bruins to give him a couple of games at the AHL level before heading to Boston. He could make his NHL debut as soon as Saturday.

• Tracey Myers, who does a great job covering the Blackhawks for NHL.com, takes a look around the league at teams' victory anthems and why they mean so much.

• The NCAA Frozen Four begins tonight in Las Vegas, with North Dakota taking on Wisconsin before Denver faces Michigan. While the Blackhawks have no current prospects taking part in the weekend, North Dakota defenseman Keaton Verhoeff is a player to keep an eye on, as he could be a target of the Blackhawks early in the first round.

• Connor McDavid factored in all five Oilers’ goals as they beat the San Jose Sharks 5-2 to take sole possession of first place in the Pacific Division. He moved past Mario Lemieux for the second-most points before age 30 with 1,215. He will not catch Wayne Gretzky, who amassed 2,072 points before his 30th birthday.

• NHL Birthday Roll Call, April 9: Ebbie Goodfellow, Jim Roberts, Rick Tocchet, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Brian Elliott, and Michael Chaput.