Blackhawks place goaltender Corey Crawford on injured reserve

Chicago Blackhawks goalie Corey Crawford makes a save. (Graham Hughes/CP)

CHICAGO — The Chicago Blackhawks have placed goaltender Corey Crawford on injured reserve and recalled goaltender Jean-Francois Berube from Rockford of the American Hockey League.

The loss of Crawford for any length of time is a huge blow for Chicago, which was just starting to play a little better after a lacklustre start. The 32-year-old Crawford is 11-7-2 with a 2.29 goals-against average and a .930 save percentage in 21 games, including 20 starts.

It’s unclear when Crawford got hurt, and the Blackhawks provided no details about the injury in their release on Friday. He made 31 saves in Thursday night’s 4-3 overtime loss to Dallas.

Anton Forsberg has been serving as Crawford’s backup, going 1-2 with a 3.71 GAA in six games in his first season with Chicago. The 26-year-old Berube made 21 appearances with the New York Islanders over the previous two seasons, going 6-4-3 with a 3.11 GAA.

[relatedlinks]

When submitting content, please abide by our submission guidelines, and avoid posting profanity, personal attacks or harassment. Should you violate our submissions guidelines, we reserve the right to remove your comments and block your account. Sportsnet reserves the right to close a story’s comment section at any time.