The Chicago Blackhawks are on the road for their first of four matchups this season against the St. Louis Blues. This is a one-game road trip as they’ll come right back home for a couple of games.
The Blackhawks enter this game 1-2-1 after earning their first win on Monday night against the Utah Mammoth. St. Louis is 2-1-0 through three games played.
Scouting St. Louis
The St. Louis Blues got hot at the end of last season and ended up making it to the playoffs as a wild-card team. This year, they come in with expectations to be a playoff team once again.
Joel Hofer is the projected starting goaltender for the Blues in this game, meaning that their star goalie Jordan Binnington will be the backup. This is how the skaters project to line up in front of Hofer:
Neighbours-Thomas-Buchnevich
Holloway-Schenn-Kyrou
Joseph-Suter-Snuggerud
Texier-Bjugstad-Walker
Fowler-Parayko
Tucker-Faulk
Broberg-Mailloux
Robert Thomas is the driver of St. Louis’s offense, and Jordan Kyrou, Pavel Buchnevich, Dylan Holloway, Jake Neighbours, and Braden Schenn help provide the secondary scoring.
Then there is Jimmy Snuggerud, who played with Oliver Moore and Sam Rinzel at the University of Minnesota. His ability to produce offense is high-level, and he won’t be in their bottom six for very long.
On defense, they are deep. Cam Fowler came over in a trade last season, and he’s paired with Colton Parayko. Having a guy like Philip Broberg on the third pair speaks to their depth beyond that great top pair.
Nick Foligno
On Wednesday morning, the Blackhawks and Nick Foligno announced that he’d be taking a brief leave of absence to be with his daughter, who is having a follow-up surgery related to her congenital heart disease.
Blackhawks Captain Nick Foligno To Take Leave Of Absence
Blackhawks captain Nick Foligno is taking a leave of absence to be with his daughter for surgery.
Projected Blackhawks Lineup
For the second time this season, Arvid Soderblom is going to start for Chicago. He played well in the overtime loss to the Boston Bruins last week, and now he comes into this game looking for his first win of the season. In front of him, the Blackhawks will skate like this:
Dach-Bedard-Burakovsky
Teravainen-Nazar-Bertuzzi
Donato-Dickinson-Mikheyev
Greene-Reichel
Vlasic-Rinzel
Grzelcyk-Murphy
Kaiser-Levshunov
Crevier
After the last game against the Mammoth, Jeff Blashill said that they will go with 11 forwards and 7 defensemen a lot this season. He described it as a great way to go about things with so many young blue-liners on the roster. With some of them, you never know what kind of night it’s going to be for them, so it’s better to have extra.
Levshunov drew back into the lineup against the Mammoth and had a good game. When he’s playing well, all seven of these guys have a case to be dressed.
Going 11/7 is also a way of getting guys like Connor Bedard and Frank Nazar extra touches with double shifts. Reichel is in the lineup in favor of Sam Lafferty, who is a healthy scratch. The top three lines have been consistent for a couple of games in a row.
How To Watch
This game is a national broadcast, as part of TNT’s doubleheader. It follows their broadcast of the Florida Panthers vs the Detroit Red Wings, which will start just after 6 PM. The Chicago Blackhawks vs the St. Louis Blues is expected to start at 8:52 PM.
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