Canucks at Blues preview
Vancouver starts road trip looking for fourth straight win; St. Louis will have Thomas back in lineup
by Louie Korac / NHL.com Independent Correspondent
CANUCKS (3-2-0) at BLUES (3-1-2)
8 p.m. ET; SN1, FS-MW, NHL.TV
The Game
The Vancouver Canucks will go for their fourth straight win when they open a four-game road trip against the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center on Thursday.
The Canucks, who have outscored their opponents 15-5 in the past three games, opened the season with consecutive losses on the road before sweeping a three-game homestand.
Goalie Thatcher Demko will make his second straight start for the Canucks while Jacob Markstrom will miss a second straight game because of personal reasons.
The Blues start a four-game homestand with forward Robert Thomas back in the lineup after he missed five games because of an upper-body injury.
Players to watch
Canucks forward J.T. Miller has six points (three goals, three assists) the past three games and needs two goals for 100 in the NHL.
Blues center Brayden Schenn has scored in an NHL career-high five straight games.
They said it
"We're playing the Stanley Cup champs. They're a good team. We're going to have to be ready to go tonight. They're just a good hockey team." -- Canucks coach Travis Green on the Blues
"They've got two good lines there up front, a lot of skill, good rush team. They do a good job off the rush with their entries and they like to have some defensemen that can get up the ice." -- Blues coach Craig Berube on the Canucks
Canucks projected lineup
J.T. Miller -- Elias Pettersson -- Brock Boeser
Tanner Pearson -- Bo Horvat -- Josh Leivo
Micheal Ferland -- Brandon Sutter -- Jake Virtanen
Tim Schaller -- Jay Beagle -- Tyler Motte
Alexander Edler -- Tyler Myers
Quinn Hughes -- Christopher Tanev
Jordie Benn -- Troy Stecher
Thatcher Demko
Zane McIntyre
Scratched: Loui Eriksson, Jacob Markstrom, Adam Gaudette, Ashton Sautner, Oscar Fantenberg
Injured: Antoine Roussel (knee)
Blues projected lineup
Jaden Schwartz -- Brayden Schenn -- Vladimir Tarasenko
Sammy Blais -- Ryan O'Reilly -- David Perron
Robby Fabbri -- Tyler Bozak -- Alexander Steen
Ivan Barbashev -- Oskar Sundqvist -- Robert Thomas
Carl Gunnarsson -- Alex Pietrangelo
Jay Bouwmeester -- Colton Parayko
Vince Dunn -- Justin Faulk
Jordan Binnington
Jake Allen
Scratched: Robert Bortuzzo, Zach Sanford, Mackenzie MacEachern
Injured: None
Status report
The Canucks will move Leivo to the second line and shift Ferland to the third line. Green said he wants to add more offense to the Horvat line. ... Green said the plan is for Markstrom to rejoin the Canucks during the weekend in New York. ... Thomas will replace MacEachern and start on the fourth line. Berube said he likes what Fabbri, Bozak and Steen brought the last game and doesn't want to break them up.
Stat pack
Pettersson has five points (two goals, three assists) during a three-game point streak. ... Sutter has four points (two goals, two assists) the past three games. ... Tarasenko has three points (one goal, two assists) the past two games.