The Blackhawks have started shifting pieces back toward Rockford, and Dominic Toninato is the latest name on the move.
Chicago announced on Oct. 18 that it had reassigned Toninato to the Rockford IceHogs as the club waits for its next game against the Montreal Canadiens on Oct. 23. With more of the roster getting healthy, the depth role Toninato filled for a brief stretch is no longer as necessary.
Toninato’s latest stint with Chicago lasted three games, and it came at a time when the Blackhawks were thin down the middle. He was brought up on Oct. 7 while Connor Bedard, Teuvo Teräväinen and Andrew Mangiapane were out with injuries, and Frank Nazar was also serving a two-game suspension. In that window, Toninato was used on a line with Ryan Donato and Oliver Moore in the bottom six.
Head coach Jeff Blashill explained the move when Toninato was recalled: "We called Tony up because he's a center. He's a good player.
I can trust him, for sure. He's a guy that's very trustworthy.
But I think it allows him to move into center. Kind of allows Mooresy (Oliver Moore) to play the wing, which I wanted to try to do.
I think Tony will do a good job with that line of giving them some stability defensively, too. He's played a lot of center in his time in pro hockey, and so I think he's a pretty stable guy and kind of similar to Greener (Ryan Greene) to be honest with you.
And he's got enough skill to make a play and move the puck to the right person, but also be dependable. And [he's] another left-shot face-off guy."
Toninato’s value was clear while Chicago was dealing with those absences. He averaged 8:52 of ice time and won 55.6 percent of his faceoffs across the three games.
This was Toninato’s second season in the organization, and he appeared in eight games for the Blackhawks last season. He had also been recalled twice then when Nick Foligno and Oliver Moore were injured.
Now that Bedard and Nazar are back, Toninato was the healthy scratch for the last two games before the reassignment. Mangiapane, meanwhile, is expected to start skating again soon. Blashill said on Oct. 16 that the team hoped Mangiapane would begin skating on his own this weekend after he was placed on injured reserve on Oct. 7 with a lower-body injury.
For Chicago, Toninato served as useful emergency depth. For Rockford, he arrives as the IceHogs try to dig out of a 1-4 start.
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