Blackhawks Game Day: 3 things to watch versus the Blues

Chicago Blackhawks (1-2-1, 3 pts) vs St. Louis Blues (2-1-0, 4 pts)
8:30 pm CT – Enterprise Center
TV: TNT (Burke/Pang)
Radio: WGN 720 AM (Wiedeman/Roumeliotis)

The Chicago Blackhawks look to win their second straight game as they take on the St. Louis Blues. Tonight’s rivalry game will be the second game of TNT’s national doubleheader, in case you’re wondering why the start is so late. The Blues have won back-to-back games after getting embarrassed 5-0 by the Minnesota Wild on opening night.

The Blackhawks will be without their captain, Nick Foligno, tonight. He is with his daughter as she undergoes follow-up surgery related to her congenital heart disease. There is no doubt that the rest of the team will rally for their captain.

Andre Burakovsky, who scored the game-winning goal against the Utah Mammoth on Monday, is happy to see the Blues on the schedule. In 32 career games against St. Louis, he has nine goals and 19 points. Ryan Donato has done well against the Blues, as well, with seven goals and 17 points in 25 games. On the flip side, Blues captain Brayden Schenn has been a Blackhawks killer in his career, scoring seven goals and 30 points in 35 games.

The Blackhawks will see backup goaltender Joel Hoffer tonight. He has won both of his career starts against Chicago, with a 1.50 goals-against average (GAA) and .936 save percentage (SV%).

7-11 Open For Business

Head coach Jeff Blashil has gone with seven defensemen and 11 forwards twice already this season. They are 1-0-1 in those games, and 0-2-0 in the two games where he used the standard six defenseman-12 forwards lineup. It certainly sounds like we'll see the 7-11 lineup often this season.

 Blashill’s explanation for this strategy makes perfect sense. With all the young defensemen on the roster, this allows him to manage their minutes and matchups better and put them in places to succeed.

“On this particular team, it evens out responsibilities,” he said. “It also, at times, makes matchups harder for the opponent because you’re able to move guys like Connor (Bedard) around. It now gives us a guy like (Connor) Murphy and Louis (Crevier) who can specialize on the penalty kill. Then the other two right-shot D, (Artyom) Levshunov and (Sam) Rinzel, to specialize on the power play. That’s a good balance.”

Big Chance for Ryan Green & Lukas Reichel

Even though Blashill doesn’t like to tip his hand during morning skate, he will likely do the 7-11 lineup again tonight. He had Sam Lafferty, Ryan Greene, and Lukas Riechel take rushes on the fourth line, but also had all seven defensemen rotating in and out.

The logical guess is that Greene and Riechel will be your fourth liners tonight. Based on the usage against Utah, they will get some shifts with Bedard and Tyler Bertuzzi. If he plays, Reichel will have a chance to play with two top-six players and strongly make his case for staying in the lineup.

Where Are the Shots?

During his introductory press conference in May, Blashill said he wants the Blackhawks to have a shoot-first mentality. We haven’t seen that yet, early in the season. Through four games, the Blackhawks are the only team in the NHL averaging less than 20 shots per game.

Yes, this number is skewed a bit because of Saturday’s game against the Montreal Canadiens. When you spend nearly a third of the game killing penalties, your shots on goal totals will suffer. But, against the Mammoth last time out, they only had 14 shots on goal, and just eight over the final 40 minutes. You can’t blame the penalty kill for this one, because they spent only six minutes shorthanded.

The Blackhawks need to find a way to generate more shots on goal. Bedard and Frank Nazar only had one shot attempt between the two of them on Monday. Even though they won, they won’t get many more points this season with that kind of output. Shoot early, shoot often tonight.

Season Series

10/15 @ STL
12/12 @ STL
1/7 vs STL
4/11 vs STL

Blackhawks Team Leaders

G-Connor Bedard/Ilya Mikheyev/Andre Burakovsky (2)
A-Frank Nazar/Teuvo Teravainen (4)
P-Nazar/Teravainen (5)
PPG-Bedard/Burakovsky (1)
GWG-Burakovsky (1)
SOG-Ryan Donato (8)
PIM-Louis Crevier (19)

Blues Team Leaders

G-Jake Neighbours (3)
A-Pavel Buchnevich/Nathan Walker (2)
P-Neighbours/Jimmy Snuggerud (3)
PPG-Snuggerud/Robert Thomas(1)
GWG-Neighbours/Snuggerud (1)
SOG-Snnugerud/Dylan Holloway (9)
PIM-Tyler Tucker

Blackhawks Team Stats

GF/G-2.50 (26th)
GA/G-2.75 (11th)
PP%-15.4 (20th)
PK%-80.0 (18th)
SOG/G-19.8 (32nd)
SA/G-30.0 (23rd)
FO%-41.7 (29th)
PIM/G-17:00 (31st)

Blues Team Stats

GF/G-3.00 (17th)
GA/G-3.00 (12th)
PP%-22.2 (11th)
PK%-80.0 (18th)
SOG/G-30.0 (12th)
SA/G-26.3 (10th)
FO%-51.6 (13th)
PIM/G-8:20 (15th)

Blackhawks Probable Lines

Forwards
Colton Dach-Connor Bedard-Andre Burakovsky
Teuvo Teravainen-Frank Nazar-Tyler Bertuzzi
Ryan Donato-Jason Dickinson-Ilya Mikheyev
Lukas Reichel-Ryan Greene

Defensemen
Alex Vlasic-Sam Rinzel
Wyatt Kaiser-Louis Crevier
Matt Grzelcyk-Connor Murphy
Artyom Levshunov

Scratched
F-Nick Foligno (personal leave), F-Sam Lafferty

Injured
G-Laurent Brossoit (knee), F-Joey Anderson (lower body), F-Landon Slaggert (lower body)

Blues Probable Lines

Forwards
Jake Neighbours-Robert Thomas-Pavel Buchnevich
Dylan Holloway-Brayden Schenn-Jordan Kyrou
Mathieu Joseph-Pius Suter-Jimmy Snuggerud
Alexandre Texier-Nick Bjugstad-Nathan Walker

Defensemen
Cam Fowler-Colton Parayko
Tyler Tucker-Justin Faulk
Philip Broberg-Logan Mailloux

Scratched
D-Matthew Kessel

Injured
F-Zach Dean (personal), D-Torey Krug (ankle), F-Oskar Sundqvist (lower body), F-Alexey Toropchenko (lower body)

Goaltending Matchup

Arvid Soderblom (0-0-1, 3.92 GAA, .879 SV%, 0 SO) vs Joel Hoffer (1-0-0, 2.00 GAA, .932 SV%)