Ouch! Blackhawks lose Bolland to back surgery for at least 2 months

Just when it appeared the Blackhawks were slowly getting healthy, the news dropped Tuesday afternoon that was expected since last Friday.

Second-line center Dave Bolland will be out three to four months after undergoing successful back surgery to repair a herniated disk.

Bolland has had back problems for the better part of two years but missed only one game last season when he had 19 goals, 47 points and was plus-19 as the Hawks' top defensive center.

Bolland reported to training camp in September with more back issues and sat out most of the preseason. He appeared in 13 of the first 14 regular-season games but needed at least three cortisone shots to get on the ice.

Bolland played 15 minutes in last Thursday's loss at Phoenix and was minus-2, but the next day at Colorado there was too much pain in his back for him to play anymore.

"Surgery is always the last option," Hawks general manager Stan Bowman said. "It's not unlike what we went through with Marian (Hossa) last summer. There are different treatments you try. We tried other things and they just didn't provide enough relief to make it effective for Dave."

Kris Versteeg has filled in at center for Bolland the last two games and that figures to continue, at least for now.

Coach Joel Quenneville also has the option of playing Patrick Sharp, Tomas Kopecky or Andrew Ebbett at center on a need basis.

Bowman stressed he is not looking to trade for a center.

"I think we've got to sort it out internally first and see what we have," Bowman said. "We've got some guys who kind of deserve the chance to see how they can play and see how that goes before jumping into anything else. That's the approach for now and we'll see how it works."

The Hawks are right up against the salary cap, including Bolland's $3.37 million cap hit. They could get some relief by putting Bolland on long-term injured reserve, but Bowman said there is no plan for that now.

"We don't need to put him on long-term IR right now because we're not adding new players to the mix," Bowman said. "That's an option if we have to do it, but you only need to tap into that if you were to basically bring in somebody who made the equivalent type salary. As it stands right now we're going to try and use the group within.

"We've got some guys internally, whether it's Sharp or Versteeg or Ebbett, who will have the opportunity to play in the middle."

Centers Jonathan Toews and John Madden will take over Bolland's defensive assignments against the opponent's top line as they did with Anze Kopitar in Monday's 4-1 win over the Kings.

The loss of the Bolland still is going to hurt the Hawks at both ends of the ice.

"Bolly is useful in so many ways," Quenneville said. "He gets a lot of quality minutes and matchup minutes and special teams as well."