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Money Maker: Blackhawks at Blues Preseason Preview

The projected lineup has a familiar name in it, too.

Posted on by L_B_R
Credit: Jeff Curry-Imagn Images

The Chicago Blackhawks are in St. Louis Thursday night to take on the Blues for their second-to-last preseason game.

The Blackhawks enter this one having just beaten the Minnesota Wild 4-3 in overtime on Monday, although it wasn’t exactly the cleanest victory. Chicago took a 3-1 lead within the first minutes of the third period before a pretty lackluster final frame allowed Minnesota to score twice and force overtime despite the Wild icing a roster made up mostly of AHL players and prospects. Bowen Byram eventually bailed the Blackhawks out by completing his hat trick just 29 seconds into overtime. It’s also not the end of the world: this is preseason, after all, and shaking off some rust is part of the point, especially with such a young lineup and so many new players. But hopefully it isn’t a carryover from last season, when the Blackhawks had an unfortunate habit of having at least one truly terrible period that was enough to undo everything good they’d do in the other two.

As for the lineup, the Blackhawks will ice a mixed group, but it looks like that will include Patrick Kane. On the blue line, Byram, Alex Vlasic, and Ian Cole are seemingly getting the night off, but the other young four defenders who will likely start in the NHL this season are expected to play. Drew Commesso is the anticipated starter in net.

This means the top six should at least resemble the lines they’ve been practicing recently, though the formation of the bottom two lines is unknown.

On Connor Bedard injury news, coach Jeff Blashill confirmed that the newly appointed captain is still a ways away from joining the team in practice, so games seems to be farther down the road, too.

Those questions to Blashill came after Bedard was spotted practicing heavier slapshots at Thursday’s morning skate:

As for the Blues, they will be without some of their top talent, including Robert Thomas, Dylan Holloway, Mason McTavish (whom they acquired last summer), Philip Broberg and others. Still, the lineup has plenty of NHL-caliber players, and Jordan Binnington will be in net, so this will be a much-closer-to-the-real-thing roster than what the Blackhawks faced on Monday.

How to watch

When: 7 p.m. CT
Where: Enterprise Center, St. Louis
TV: CHSN
Webstream: ESPN+
Radio: WGN 720

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