The Chicago Blackhawks won't have a valuable trade asset or consistent contributor if they keep limiting Lukas Reichel's ice time.
The Chicago Blackhawks are off to a decent start, but that will likely change quickly.
Their 3-2-2 record has them sitting fourth in the Central Division, sixth when looking at points percentage. But the Blackhawks have a killer part of their schedule immediately ahead against the Tampa Bay Lightning, Los Angeles Kings, Winnipeg Jets, Edmonton Oilers and Vancouver Canucks over the course of the next three weeks. We anticipate the Hawks will soon sink to a familiar place: the bottom of the Central.
That said, there are bright spots on this team after nearly two weeks. Forwards Frank Nazar and Connor Bedard have seven points in seven games, defenseman Sam Rinzel is averaging 21:04 of ice time, and goaltender Spencer Knight has an incredible .937 save percentage and 1.96 goals-against average in five games.
The record and schedule illustrate why everyone must think less about where the Hawks are in the standings and more about seeing which youngsters in the system and on the roster they want to keep for the long term and who they want to move on from.
One intriguing player is left winger Lukas Reichel, who's been the subject of trade rumors and speculation in the past month. In September, The Athletic's Scott Powers reported the Blackhawks are willing to move Reichel.
He’s played only four games, but against the St. Louis Blues on Oct. 15, Reichel went off for two goals and three points. He did so while playing just 13:11 of ice time.
In his other three games, Reichel played 10:42 against the Canucks, 7:47 against the Anaheim Ducks and only 6:41 against the Montreal Canadiens. Reichel did get about four-and-a-half minutes of ice time with Bedard against the Blues and about three minutes with Nazar against the Canucks, but he's mainly played with Ryan Greene or Landon Slaggert in the bottom six, according to naturalstattrick.com.
The Canucks and Ducks games happened after Reichel’s big night against the Blues, so it’s obvious Blackhawks coach Jeff Blashill hasn’t been overly impressed by the 23-year-old no matter what he did or didn’t do on the scoresheet.
But if Reichel doesn’t have a long-term future in Chicago, and the Hawks aren’t going to be a playoff team this season, why not showcase Reichel in the next month or so? If he responds well to that challenge, Blackhawks GM Kyle Davidson suddenly has a couple of options: drum up a trade market and get some type of decent asset in return for Reichel or keep the player for the long haul and help him grow his game.
However, by limiting Reichel to the Hawks’ bottom six – and giving him the third-lowest average ice time on the team – Davidson and Blashill are ensuring Chicago won’t get much of anything in a trade.
Reichel wouldn’t be the first NHL player who needed a change of scenery to find his game. He’s under contract for this season at just $1.2 million, and he’ll be an RFA next summer.
Given that Reichel has career highs of just eight goals and 22 points – both of which were set last season – Reichel doesn’t have much in the way of negotiating leverage. But who knows – maybe he will realize the potential he had when the Blackhawks drafted him 17th overall in 2020. If they play him more, and he responds well to having more minutes, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to give Reichel more leverage, as he would be contributing more productively.
Drafting and developing young players is an inexact science, as you never know when an NHL prospect figures things out and becomes a valuable piece of the puzzle. While Reichel has been in the league since 2022, he’s only had two full(ish) seasons under his belt, with 65 and 70 games in 2023-24 and 2024-25. The window may be closing for him in Chicago, but that doesn’t mean another window won’t open for him somewhere else.
A little more time and patience with Reichel could result in salvaging something out of him as an asset. Because slowly cutting off Reichel’s ice time and somehow expecting him to grow is not an ideal way to achieve that goal.
It’s crucial for Chicago to develop players either as core components for the long term or as trade chips to acquire other helpful players. That’s where they are with Reichel, and it will be intriguing to see how his future unfolds, either in the Windy City or somewhere else. What they're doing right now to him isn not good enough.
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