At 5-5-2 through 12 games, the Blackhawks are sticking with what works

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

The Blackhawks have faced a number of injuries early in this hockey season. Several goalies and several skaters. When disorder such as this plagues a sports team, things can get complicated, but head coach Luke Richardson wants to keep things as consistent as possible.

After all, at 5-5-2, they are a .500 team by points percentage.

"I don't think we've gone through a lull of bad play," Richardson said. "We've had some stretches where we haven't won a game in regulation or gotten a full win, but I don't think there's been consistency of a line not doing well, so there really has been no reason to (change the lines)."

As he mentioned, the Hawks have been through a four-game losing streak - two of which were overtime/shootout losses - but apparently, Richardson hasn't seen a drastically poor performance from any specific lines.

"The team responds really well," he said, "so really there's no need to have big shake-ups. It just makes sense what we have going right now."

And with the team now prepping for a two-game California road trip against the Kings and the Ducks, Richardson just wants to focus on the positives from their recent games and "push through and do the same thing and bear down on a few of those chances."

Mrazek is back:

After running through four goalies in nine games, Petr Mrazek is expected to be in net at some point this weekend, as he has been back on the ice and practicing with the team for about a week now. He has been out since Oct. 21 when he suffered a groin strain in the first period against the Red Wings.

"I think we'll probably be smart and split the duties," Richardson said. "(Goaltending coach Jimmy Waite's) going to do a little research on past records and stuff like that. We'll make that decision probably tomorrow, so we'll let the goalies know and get prepared."

Injury update:

Among the slew of other injuries are goalies Alex Stalock and Arvid Söderblom; defensemen Seth Jones and Ian Mitchell; and forward Tyler Johnson. Richardson said Stalock got on the ice Tuesday morning and did some puck-handling, but didn't take any shots.

Söderblom, who left the game against the Jets with what seemed to be a dehydration issue, was back on the ice Tuesday morning and will most likely play in one of the games in California this coming weekend. Richardson says that Jones and Johnson are also skating.

"They're not near to coming back, but it's just nice to see people on the upswing," he said.

And Mitchell participated in his "first, real full practice in a regular jersey" Tuesday morning according to Richardson. "More than likely, he'll have to get some games in Rockford. He hasn't had anything at all in training camp."