St. Louis Blues Continue Homestand Against Struggling Anaheim Ducks
St. Louis Blues Game 10/82: Thursday, October 29, 7:00 PM vs. Anaheim Ducks
The St. Louis Blues play their third game of a six-game homestand on Thursday night, hosting the Anaheim Ducks at Scottrade Center. After taking the loss to the New York Islanders in their first exposure to three-on-three overtime on Saturday, the Blues rebounded and shut out the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-0 on Tuesday night. The Blues will be looking to continue that winning streak on Thursday and potentially move into a three-way tie for first place in the Central Division if the Minnesota Wild defeat the Dallas Stars.
In a surprising development, Anaheim is off to a horrid start thus far, as they’re 1-6-2 through nine games and have a Western Conference-worst four points. Anaheim finished tied with the Blues atop the Western Conference last season (109 points) and had the number one seed going into the postseason (they ultimately lost in the Western Conference finals to the Chicago Blackhawks).
This year, however, Anaheim has had a major shortage of offense; the team has a horrid nine goals in nine games, forward Mike Santorelli leads the team with just three points, and eight of the team’s skaters, who account for 40 total games played, have not yet registered a point. Despite the team’s immense success last season, coach Bruce Boudreau‘s job is reportedly at stake, and whether it comes from a coaching change or not, the team is going to have to make some rapid and significant adjustments in order to salvage the season.
—
The Blues’ lineup is expected to remain the same as it was Tuesday, though with no official morning skate on Thursday there’s not any real way to know. It’s possible that forward Ty Rattie, who GM Doug Armstrong and coach Ken Hitchcock have said will get playing time despite being a healthy scratch on Tuesday, could get in the lineup on Thursday. If that were to be the case, it would be a toss-up as to who would be taken out of the lineup.
After getting the Blues’ first shutout of the season on Tuesday, Jake Allen earns his first set of back-to-back starts and will be between the pipes against Anaheim. Allen shut out the Ducks on October 30 of last year, and nearly a year later he’ll try to do the same.
More from Arch Authority
- St. Louis Cardinals: Randal Grichuk to begin Double-A rehab stint
- John Brebbia deserves a shot as the St. Louis Cardinals’ closer
- St. Louis Cardinals place Randal Grichuk on DL, recall José Martínez
- St. Louis Cardinals release RHP Corey Baker from organization
- St. Louis Cardinals activate Kolten Wong and Kevin Siegrist from DL, option Luke Weaver and Alex Mejia to Triple-A
Alexander Steen-Jori Lehtera–Vladimir Tarasenko
Scottie Upshall–David Backes–Dmitrij Jaskin
Robby Fabbri–Scott Gomez–Troy Brouwer
Steve Ott–Kyle Brodziak–Ryan Reaves
Alex Pietrangelo–Jay Bouwmeester
Carl Gunnarsson–Colton Parayko
Joel Edmundson–Robert Bortuzzo
Jake Allen
Next: Martin Havlat, Dainius Zubrus Join Blues for Professional Tryouts
Check out our Arch Authority Blues page for more up-to-date coverage.