A day before the first formal meetings between the NHL Players' Association and the NHL in weeks, the league cancelled what remained of its preseason schedule on Thursday.

The cancellation of the preseason schedule was necessary because of the absence of a collective bargaining agreement between the NHLPA and the NHL," a league statement said.

A day doesn't go by during the lockout where an NHL player doesn't sign overseas. But Blackhawks winger Patrick Kane won't be joining the growing list of NHLers in Europe anytime soon.

The NHL announced Wednesday that preseason games through Sept. 30 have been cancelled because of its lockout of players.

The posturing has begun.

With the current collective bargaining agreement coming to an end after this season, the first public battle between the NHL and the NHL Players' Association took place Friday with the release of separate statements.

Not everyone is on board with the NHL's new conference alignment, which brings back divisional playoffs in a four-conference format. Blackhawks veteran Andrew Brunette has his concerns.

EDMONTON, Alberta -- Blackhawks general manager Stan Bowman didn't sound like his trade for Michael Frolik was his last.

In fact, he made it sound like more moves were on the way.

If you haven't seen them yet ... here are the NHL 2009-10 All-Star teams:

It's official now. About a week after the cover was leaked and displayed by Yahoo's popular Puck Daddy blog, EA Sports announced that Hawks captain Jonathan Toews will be on the cover of NHL 11.

Patrick Kane was the cover boy of last year's video game, which continues to win awards.

Here's Toews on the cover:

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A look at the notable moves made during Dale Tallon's run as general manager from June 21, 2005, to July 14, 2009, that make the Hawks what they are today -- a team in the Western Conference finals for the second consecutive year:

Here's a look back at the Hawks' first-round series win over the Nashville Predators. It wasn't an easy series, and the Hawks never expected it to be.

"Whenever you can win a playoff series, especially against a team like Nashville, it feels good," Patrick Sharp said. "I don't know who said it was going to be an easy series or we were going to get upset. It was two teams that played hard going back to the regular season. It was a very tough series. I give them a lot of credit. It could have really gone either way."