Projected Lineup: Avalanche at Blues

ST. LOUIS--Philipp Grubauer will return to the Colorado Avalanche's crease this evening when the Avs take on the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center.
It will be his first appearance since he suffered a lower-body injury on Dec. 7 in the first period of Colorado's game at the Boston Bruins. He was able to finish that contest on the bench as the backup goaltender but missed both of the Avalanche's following two outings. He recovered enough to serve as the backup netminder on Friday against the New Jersey Devils.

Goaltender Pavel Francouz has played in six of the Avs' last eight matchups and is 7-0-1 with a 2.03 goals-against average and .938 save percentage in his last 10 games. He did not participate in Colorado's practice on Sunday in Denver as he was ill but he is better and will backup tonight.
"We tossed around playing Frankie again, but when he got sick after the game there and has kind of been under the weather for the last 36 hours or so," said head coach Jared Bednar. "He is feeling better this morning but just been kind of waiting for the opportunity for Grubi to feel real good and get back in the net. No better time than tonight against the Blues."
The Avalanche's healthy scratches will be forward Vladislav Kamenev and defenseman Anton Lindholm.
Lindholm was recalled from the American Hockey League's Colorado Eagles on Sunday. He has four points in 62 NHL contests over the past three seasons. So far this year, the Skelleftea, Sweden, native has one goal and one assist in 22 AHL outings.
Below is the Avalanche's projected lineup based on the forward combinations and defensive pairings from practice on Sunday. They are subject to change.
Forwards
95 Andre Burakovsky - 29 Nathan MacKinnon - 96 Mikko Rantanen
92 Gabriel Landeskog - 91 Nazem Kadri - 72 Joonas Donskoi
11 Matt Calvert - 41 Pierre-Edouard Bellemare - 13 Valeri Nichushkin
83 Matt Nieto - 17 Tyson Jost - 37 J.T. Compher
Defensemen
16 Nikita Zadorov - 49 Samuel Girard
27 Ryan Graves - 28 Ian Cole
48 Calle Rosen - 44 Mark Barberio
Goaltenders
31 Philipp Grubauer
39 Pavel Francouz
Scratches: Vladislav Kamenev, Anton Lindholm
Injury Report: Erik Johnson (lower body), Cale Makar (upper body), Colin Wilson (lower body)