Will Corey Crawford Be Back In Chicago Next Season?

The Chicago Blackhawks and general manager Stan Bowman have been one of the teams getting things done while the 2019-20 season has remained on pause. Whether the season will be finished remains a huge question mark and whether or not we'll have a Stanley Cup champion all depends on how long this pandemic lasts. Which of course puts some question marks regarding when free agency will happen and how it will take shape in such a unique situation. Bowman has already locked up forward Matthew Highmore and goalie Kevin Lankinen to contract extensions but he's still got one big name to deal with. The Blackhawks won't have much salary cap space to deal with but they'll need some of it for Corey Crawford. Crawford has no plans to retire while wanting to finish his career in Chicago and the Blackhawks have no #1 goalie for next year, Charlie Roumeliotis of NBC Sports Chicago points out that Crawford will likely be willing to accept a short term team friendly contract. If the cap stays the same next year, the Hawks are currently projected to have between $9-10million in cap space and have restricted free agents Drake Caggiula, Dominik Kubalik, Dylan Strome and Slater Koekkoek due for new contracts along with goalie Malcolm Subban. Subban could be traded and we've already learned that Bowman has been trying hard to trade Strome so that leaves the Hawks with the $10million to break up between Crawford, Caggiula, Kubalik and possibly Koekkoek.