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Quenneville believes Oduya will be ‘all right’ for Game 4

St. Louis Blues v Chicago Blackhawks - Game Six

Johnny Oduya

Getty Images

CHICAGO -- Sounds like Chicago’s blueline won’t be even further thinned out at the Stanley Cup Final.

The day after a 3-2 defeat to Tampa Bay in Game 3, Chicago head coach Joel Quenneville said that injured defenseman Johnny Oduya -- who played just 9:10 over the final two periods last night -- looked to be OK and could be ready to go for Wednesday’s Game 4.

“I think he’ll be all right,” Quenneville said on Tuesday. “He looked all right today. We’ll see how he is tomorrow.”

The ‘Hawks can ill-afford to lose Oduya’s services. He’s averaging over 24 minutes a night as one of Chicago’s much talked-about top-four defensemen and, if he’s out, the club would suddenly then have to promote one of Kyle Cumiskey, Trevor van Riemsdyk, David Rundblad or Kimmo Timonen into a more prominent role -- which could prove problematic given all four have their, ahem, limitations.

Not much is known on the severity of Oduya’s injury. It’s of the upper-body variety, and was believed to have occurred on a second-period hit from Tampa Bay forward Ondrej Palat.