The NHL schedule makers didn’t do the Chicago Blackhawks any favors to open the 2026-27 season.
With the league announcing home openers and the first four games of the year, the Blackhawks’ path out of the gate looks rough. Chicago will start on the road for the ninth straight season, and the first stop is a demanding one: Tuesday, Sept. 29 at the Vegas Golden Knights, the reigning Western Conference champions.
The trip doesn’t get much kinder after that. The Blackhawks head to the Utah Mammoth on Thursday, Oct. 1, giving them back-to-back games against playoff teams from last season. Chicago did have success against Utah a year ago, sweeping the three-game series, but the challenge remains obvious.
Then comes a cross-country swing to face the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday, Oct. 3. The source notes the question of whether Patrick Kane will be in the lineup for that one.
That means three straight road games against teams that reached the playoffs last season, and the Blackhawks will be doing it without Connor Bedard in any of those contests. That puts even more pressure on the rest of the roster, especially with no room for a slow start.
Chicago finally gets home on Tuesday, Oct. 6, when the St. Louis Blues visit the United Center. The Blackhawks and Blues will also meet twice in the preseason.
The league said the 2026-27 regular season will open on Tuesday, Sept. 29 and will be expanded to 84 games with the addition of two more divisional contests per team. The rest of the schedule is set to be released tomorrow.
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But the trade also invites a harder question: whether Chicago paid for certainty in a market that may have offered more paths to the same fix. Free-agent veterans such as John Klingberg, Jacob Trouba and John Carlson were out there as possible alternatives, and there were other avenues the Blackhawks could have explored if they wanted to avoid surrendering so much future capital. Buffalo, meanwhile, turned the pick it received from Chicago into defenseman Daxon Rudolph, a reminder that the cost of landing Byram was about more than just the contract. [Read more 🡒]