Craig “Chief… Berube will be making his St. Louis Blues head coaching debut tonight when the Blues taken on the Nashville Predators in Tennessee. Berube took a very similar path to his 2nd head coaching position. Before he was hired to be the Philadelphia Flyers head coach, he was the head coach of their minor league affiliate and replaced the coach who replaced Ken Hitchcock. With St. Louis, he spent time as head coach their AHL affiliate and again follows the coach who replaced Ken Hitchcock. If the pattern holds, we’ll see him in Edmonton in a few years. Blues fans of course want him to have success here, bringing the 1st ever Stanley Cup to St. Louis.
As soon as yesterday, it seems clear that there is a new Chief in town. Berube said “we’re going to be a demanding coaching group and it starts in practice. It starts in practice. Being ready to practice and practicing hard and doing things right in practice and demanding it in practice. It carries over to the game.… Losing their “players’ coach… is something the Blues players did this to themselves. I wonder if Berube will make some of the core yearn for Ken Hitchcock.
Berube’s 1st test is tough, facing the Predators who have won two games in a row and seven of their last ten. They have the best points percentage in the league, are the best defensive team and are in the top 10 in scoring. The only thing they have been poor at is the power play where they are the 2nd most futile.
Berube is already making changes as you can see in the projected lineup that will look like this: Sanford - O'Reilly - Tarasenko Fabbri – Schenn - Thomas Perron – Bozak – Blais Soshnikov – Barbashev - Sundqvist Dunn-Pietrangelo Edmundson-Parayko Bouwmeester-Schmaltz Allen
Pat Maroon, Alexander Steen, Jaden Schwartz, Carl Gunnarsson, and Robert Bortuzzo are all still out.
Larry Robinson was on the ice for practice today and will be behind the bench tonight.
NHL Champions for Charity We’ve gotten some traction on the charity wager among the Central Division bloggers. More on that to come. It’s a great day for hockey.