Blackhawks Analyst Eddie Olczyk Back On TV This Week

CHICAGO, IL — Chicago native and former Blackhawks player Eddie Olczyk returns to the broadcast booth this week as the team's TV analyst nearly two months after he announced he was battling colon cancer. He will join Mike “Doc” Emrick to call the Blackhawks' nationally broadcast game against the St. Louis Blues on NBCSN, and then Olczyk and Pat Foley will work Chicago's locally televised matchup with the Edmonton Oilers on WGN-TV, USA Today first reported this week. Faceoff is 7 p.m. for Wednesday's game and 7:30 p.m. for Thursday's contest.

Olcyzk — a Hall of Famer who played two stints with the Blackhawks from 1984-1987 and 1999-2000 — has completed three weeks of his 24-week chemotherapy program, he told USA Today. The individual treatments run for 48 hours, spending two hours at Northwestern Memorial Hospital before receiving the rest of the treatment at home. That means Olczyk, 50, won't be working a full slate of game broadcasts initially.

"We have some dates that we have highlighted, and hopefully, I will be strong enough to do the job," he told USA Today. "If I am not feeling good, I just have to be honest with everyone and tell them I can’t do it." (Get Patch real-time email alerts for the latest news for Chicago — or your neighborhood. And iPhone users: Check out Patch's new app.)

RELATED: Blackhawks Analyst Eddie Olczyk Battling Colon Cancer

Olczyk described going through the therapy regimen as "grinding it out," and he can suffer from nausea and general fatigue because of it. He also developed a blood clot during his second chemo session, which took 10 days of recovery time.

Chicago Blackhawks at St. Louis Blues

• When: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 18
• TV: NBCSN

Chicago Blackhawks vs. Edmonton Oilers

• When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 19
• TV: WGN-TV

But Olcyzk told USA Today that he sees his broadcast work as a positive way to deal with what he's going through.

“Doing what I love to do will help me pass the time,” he said. “Looking at the calendar hour by hour, day by day, week by week, month by month gets a little long.”

More via USA Today

Eddie Olczyk at the 40th annual U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony & Dinner in 2012. (Photo by Ronald Martinez | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images)

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