On Wednesday morning, the Blackhawks provided an injury update on Connor Bedard, which confirmed a report earlier in the day from Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli.
Bedard underwent surgery on Monday to repair a fractured jaw and is expected to be out for 6-8 weeks:
With Bedard’s injury occurring on Friday, Jan. 5, this would put his return somewhere in mid-February, perhaps the Saturday, Feb. 17 game at home against the Ottawa Senators or the Monday, Feb. 19 game on the road against the Carolina Hurricanes. Returning to face Ottawa would mean that Bedard would miss 15 games of his rookie season, which isn’t as bad as the absence Connor McDavid endured during his rookie season, when a broken clavicle limited him to just 45 games.
That’s about the best sugarcoating which can be applied to this unfortunate development.