Robert Thomas looks to help get the Blues on the board first and help hold the lead for the game as they win their sixth straight game
Everyone has had their focus on the Oilers as of late with their historic winning streak but what has flown under many people’s radar is the Blues five game winning streak, beating the likes of Canucks, Flames and Kraken. What is even more impressive is three of the five wins were on the road and now get to return home for a matchup against the Blue Jackets, who've only won six of their 23 road games this season.
Their weakness on the road is the backend as it allows the third-most goals per road game with a 3.87 average. They have seen a nice surge in production from youngster Yegor Chinakhov, who’s picked things up with four goals and a team-lead seven points in their last 11 games.
The young Blue Jackets roster is going through a rebuild and would love to win a big game against a hot team like the Blues, where St. Louis is in a three-way tie in points with the Kings and Predators for the last two West Wild Card spots with every win mattering. These two should produce a great game and if you want to get in on the action, here is our best bets for tonight’s matchup.
All betting lines are from Bet365 and are subject to change. Please gamble responsibly.
Pick: Robert Thomas over 0.5 assists (-130)
On their winning streak, the Blues top line of Pavel Buchnevich, Robert Thomas and Jordan Kyrou have caught fire with the three combining for seven goals and 20 points. They’ve been dynamic with Thomas dishing the puck with ease as the lines centre.
His seven assists in their last five games is second-best in the league during that span, tied with Ivan Barbashev and Noah Dobson along with being one behind Quinn Hughes who leads with eight. His playmaking ability is starting to be recognized and he should have a relatively easy time generating scoring chances against a Blue Jackets team that isn’t great defensively on the road.
Pick: Blues score first + win (+125)
A key area of the Blues game that they are good at is holding onto leads with the fourth-most wins when scoring first with 20 games on the season that is tied with the Panthers and Rangers. Every team around them in this statistic is elite with the Blues being one game ahead of teams like the Avalanche, Jets and Oilers.
They’ve had a pair of above average goaltenders this season with Jordan Binnington and Joel Hofer both repping goals against averages under three and save percentages above .907 on the season. Binnington is expected to get the net and he’s not given up the first goal in two of his last three starts as well.