Hawks stress Toews’ injury not serious

Jonathan Toews officially withdrew from the All-Star Game on Tuesday and was placed on injured reserve, but the Blackhawks remain hopeful their captain can return to the lineup when they play next on Jan. 31 at Vancouver.

“We’ll see how he progresses this week, but we said the injury is not serious, and it’s not,” coach Joel Quenneville said.

General manager Stan Bowman said putting Toews on IR, retroactive to Sunday with an injury to his left hand, was done purely to open a roster spot for rookie center Brandon Pirri to be recalled from Rockford for Tuesday’s game against Nashville.

Since a player needs to spent only a minimum of seven days on IR, Toews would be eligible to play next week against the Canucks.

“He should be fine,” Bowman said. “We expect him to be on the road trip and play next week.”

Quenneville said injured winger Patrick Sharp would also make the road trip, although there still is no timetable for his return.

Sharp has the cast off his broken left wrist but needs to get his full range of motion back.

The NHL named Philadelphia’s Scott Hartnell to replace Toews on the all-star roster for Sunday’s game in Ottawa.

Stepping up:

At least for one night, Dave Bolland was the Hawks’ No. 1 center with Jonathan Toews out with a left hand injury.

Bolland normally is the Hawks’ checking center, but in terms of pure skill he ranks right up there with even the best of his teammates.

Bolland once had a 130-point season his final year of juniors at London in 2005-06, and that was in only 59 games.

“When I’m playing that third-line role, you might not get those chances,” Bolland said. “There are times you do want to get in that offensive role and move forward with it, but for myself it’s just sticking with my same game.

“Hopefully Tazer’s not out that long and it’s just a minor things. For us, when a guy goes down, another guys has to step up in a different way.”

Prior to Tuesday, Bolland had 5 goals and 3 assists in seven games helping fill the offensive void left by the wrist injury to Patrick Sharp.

Kids on call:

Joel Quenneville hinted at least one, and possibly more from the group of rookie forwards Ben Smith, Brandon Pirri, Andrew Shaw and Jimmy Hayes, would return to Rockford to play during the six-day all-star break.

Rockford has games scheduled for Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

The Hawks dressed five rookie forwards against Nashville in Marcus Kruger, Smith, Pirri, Shaw and Hayes.

“I think they’ve all done a good job,” Joel Quenneville said. “The one thing you want to measure with these young guys is their consistency from game to game and so far they’ve given us some good signs they’re going to keep getting better. Hopefully, whatever they do during the break they can keep their focus in the right areas.”