It was New Year\u2019s Eve the last time these two teams met and the festivities began early even before the ball dropped as the Colorado Avalanche demolished the St. Louis Blues that evening in a 6-1 final. Valeri Nichushkin scored one of Colorado\u2019s three hat tricks in the 2025-26 season to ring in the new year. <\/p>\n
Now in the home stretch of the regular season these two teams meet for a home-and-home to conclude their season series against each other. First the Avalanche are hosts and then the series shifts to St. Louis on Tuesday night. Both teams are seemingly going in different directions, the Avalanche are two points away from clinching the Central Division and the Western Conference number one seed. The Blues are making one last push while refusing to play out the string and get to their summer vacations. Can Colorado grab four points over St. Louis in the process?<\/p>\n
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Colorado Avalanche (50-15-10)<\/p>\n
The Opponent:\u00a0St. Louis Blues (32-31-12)<\/p>\n
Time:\u00a07:30 p.m. MT<\/p>\n
Watch:\u00a0ESPN<\/p>\n
Listen:\u00a0Altitude Sports Radio, 92.5 FM<\/p>\n
Colorado Avalanche<\/p>\n
Injuries have been the story for Colorado since the Olympic break as there was a major wave of players hitting the infirmary and then four forwards returned over the recently concluded road trip. Now just Nic Roy is on the shelf up front but the biggest concern by far is the health of Cale Makar who left the game against Calgary on March 30th with an upper-body injury. It has been deemed \u201cnot serious\u201d but something that will keep him out of action for a little while as he\u2019s not expected to play in this contest.<\/p>\n
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The other storyline for the burgundy and blue is their clinching scenario after a big win in Dallas just a night ago. The magic number is down to two and can be achieved with a simple win in this contest. Securing the President\u2019s Trophy is on the horizon before any resting discussion can begin. Taking care of business in this home-and-home would go a long way to achieving that goal.<\/p>\n
Projected Lineup<\/p>\n
Artturi Lehkonen \u2014 Nathan MacKinnon \u2014 Martin Necas<\/p>\n
Gabriel Landeskog \u2014 Brock Nelson \u2014 Valeri Nichushkin<\/p>\n
Ross Colton \u2014 Nazem Kadri \u2014 Logan O\u2019Connor<\/p>\n
Parker Kelly \u2014 Jack Drury \u2014 Joel Kiviranta<\/p>\n
Devon Toews \u2014 Sam Malinski<\/p>\n
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Brett Kulak \u2014 Josh Manson<\/p>\n
Nick Blankenburg \u2014 Brent Burns<\/p>\n
St. Louis Blues<\/p>\n
It looked like an early lost season for the blue note but they have made it interesting since the Olympic break, losing only four times in the month of March and just twice in regulation. Still, it\u2019s an uphill battle into a playoff spot, though not impossible, for St. Louis but this game doesn\u2019t look as easy on paper as it would have just a month ago. <\/p>\n
Top center Robert Thomas escaped the trade deadline and still leads the Blues in points with 53. Backup goaltender Joel Hofer has been a revelation lately as he picked up his 20th win on the season in their big win against Anaheim on Friday night and has been a major catalyst for St. Louis getting back into the playoff picture.<\/p>\n
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Projected Lineup<\/p>\n
Dylan Holloway \u2014 Robert Thomas \u2014 Jimmy Snuggerud<\/p>\n
Jake Neighbours \u2014 Pavel Buchnevich \u2014 Jordan Kyrou<\/p>\n
Otto Stenberg \u2014 Dalibor Dvorsky \u2014 Jonatan Berggren<\/p>\n
Alexey Toropchenko \u2014 Jack Finley \u2014 Pius Suter<\/p>\n
Philip Broberg \u2014 Logan Mailloux<\/p>\n
Theo Lindstein \u2014 Colton Parayko<\/p>\n
Cam Fowler \u2014 Justin Holl<\/p>\n
Goaltenders<\/p>\n
Both teams are employing some sort of ride the hot hand tandem at present moment. Colorado seems to view Scott Wedgewood as their starter without confirming it but both he and Mackenzie Blackwood should see the net in this little mini-series with the Blues. Considering Wedgewood took the crease yesterday against Dallas it should be Blackwood\u2019s turn in net tonight.<\/p>\n
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For the Blues, they quietly have found the aforementioned recent success with their backup in Joel Hofer and he could see the net in both games against the Avalanche if they want to ride the upward momentum of their playoff push.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It was New Year\u2019s Eve the last time these two teams met and the festivities began early even…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":542826,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5116],"tags":[3936,2320,193,1772,3592,1034,1116,538,192,144,5277,1476,1543,1296,7,5,515,1478,514,1190,1036,7394,1479,1544,4166,1123,517,2054,4,19340,6295,531,1298,1807,1482,1351,4520,2565,534,84,3922],"class_list":{"0":"post-542825","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-colorado-avalanche","8":"tag-alexey-toropchenko","9":"tag-artturi-lehkonen","10":"tag-avalanche","11":"tag-brent-burns","12":"tag-brett-kulak","13":"tag-brock-nelson","14":"tag-cale-makar","15":"tag-cam-fowler","16":"tag-colorado","17":"tag-colorado-avalanche","18":"tag-coloradoavalanche","19":"tag-colton-parayko","20":"tag-devon-toews","21":"tag-dylan-holloway","22":"tag-gabriel-landeskog","23":"tag-hockey","24":"tag-jack-drury","25":"tag-jake-neighbours","26":"tag-jimmy-snuggerud","27":"tag-joel-hofer","28":"tag-joel-kiviranta","29":"tag-jonatan-berggren","30":"tag-jordan-kyrou","31":"tag-josh-manson","32":"tag-logan-mailloux","33":"tag-mackenzie-blackwood","34":"tag-nathan-mackinnon","35":"tag-nazem-kadri","36":"tag-nhl","37":"tag-nick-blankenburg","38":"tag-parker-kelly","39":"tag-pavel-buchnevich","40":"tag-philip-broberg","41":"tag-pius-suter","42":"tag-robert-thomas","43":"tag-ross-colton","44":"tag-sam-malinski","45":"tag-scott-wedgewood","46":"tag-st-louis","47":"tag-st-louis-blues","48":"tag-valeri-nichushkin"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}