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I'm here in beautiful British Columbia and what perfect timing as it's the setting for the 2019 WJHC.

The Blackhawks have 7 players involved in this year's tournament which ties them for 1st amongst NHL teams for the most. They would have led the way with 8 had Niklas Nordgren not suffered a concussion.

The teams they are tied with are the Montreal Canadiens and the Philadelphia Flyers.

As per NHL.com, 29 teams will have at least 1 prospect in the tournament with the Minnesota Wild and Tampa Bay Lightning the only ones without a player selected.

There will be lots of Hughes vs. Kakko chatter as well. These 2 are currently slated to go #1 and #2 in the 2019 Entry Draft (which is also being held in Vancouver).

How did the babiest of Hawks do yesterday in game #1? Well, pretty good from what I saw:

* Canada thumped Denmark 14-0 with Ian Mitchell collecting 2 assists, +4 over 16+ mins. Mackenzie Entwhistle had a goal in 10+ mins TOI. He is being used as the 13th forward / PK specialist right now but I have a feeling he will work himself up the lineup.

* Evan Barratt scored the game-winner and was named the player of the game in US' 2-1 win over Slovakia. He also had a game-high 7 shots on goal. I really enjoyed watching him buzz around out there. Admittedly, I haven't been able to catch any of Barratt's games this year.

* Adam Boqvist and Henri Jokiharju went head-to-head last night in the last game. Boqvist's team was victorious with a 2-1 win. Boqvist had 2 secondary assists, a game-high 6 shots on goal over 15+ mins. Jokiharju, as expected was a workhorse for Finland leading them with 25+ TOI.

* I was really impressed with Phillip Kurashev for the Swiss. He takes all the key draws and is being used… a lot. He led Switzerland with almost 25 mins of ice time… as a forward. He registered an assist and was a -1 as he was on the goal against during the 3-on-3 OT loss to the Czech. Jakob Galvas played 25 mins as well and will be a key top pairing D for the Czech during the entire tournament.

There are 4 games again today for you to check out:

* Denmark vs. Russia (4 pm EST)
* Sweden vs. Slovakia (6 pm EST)
* Canada vs. Switzerland (8 pm EST)
* Finland vs. Kazakhstan (10 pm EST)

Check out your Blackhawks prospects as you see fit over your holidays.

Who did you like the most on day #1?

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Now back to NHL action. The Hawks take on the Wild tonight at the UC.

The Wild sit just 5 points ahead of the Hawks in the Central, good for 5th in the division.

The Hawks are 1-0-1 vs. Minnesota this year with a 4-3 OTL at the start of the year and a 3-1 win in November.

MIN was dealt some bad news with Matt Dumba now out for 3 months after having surgery to repair a pectoral muscle. Other than that, they are fairly healthy.

I'm looking at a few things for tonight's game:

* Delia – give this kid the net and see what he can do
* Keith – I want to see his give a "care" meter go up… a lot. He looks very disinterested at times and the Hawks need him to pick up his play.
* DeBrincat – he's so hot right now. Can he keep it up?

Finally, I have a few but need more questions for my year end mailbag article. Send them over via DM or post on the message board.

See ya out there!

JL

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