Sharks Bring Early Momentum Into St. Louis for Blues' Survival Test
San Jose rolls into Enterprise Center with a 2-1-0 record, looking like a team that has no interest in playing the role of easy victim. St. Louis, sitting at 1-2-0, needs a win tonight to avoid digging an early-season hole that gets harder to climb out of with every passing week.
The story on San Jose right now is Macklin Celebrini. Five points — all assists — through three games is a remarkable early-season pace, and it signals that the Sharks' offense is running through him in a real way. Igor Chernyshov has converted twice already, making him the team's goal-scoring engine, and the combination of a distributor and a finisher working in sync is exactly what makes San Jose dangerous tonight. Alex Nedeljkovic is expected to start in net for the Sharks, and how he handles the Enterprise Center crowd will matter — road goaltending is where games like this get decided.
St. Louis has a different kind of problem. The Blues are 1-2-0 and searching for consistency. Mason McTavish leads the team with 2 goals, and Connor McMichael has been their most well-rounded contributor with 3 points on 2 assists — but a team that needs to win at home can't afford to rely on a thin group of contributors to carry the load. Joel Hofer is expected to get the start between the pipes for St. Louis, and he'll need to be sharp against a Sharks squad that has clearly found its offensive rhythm early.
Our model doesn't have a validated read on this one, so I won't manufacture a lean where there isn't one. What I will say is this: the records tell a clear story about which team has more to prove tonight. San Jose is playing with confidence; St. Louis is playing with urgency. Those are two very different emotional states, and urgency doesn't always win. Watch Celebrini's playmaking against a Blues defensive structure that hasn't looked airtight, and watch whether Hofer can steal the Blues a point when they need it most. Puck drops at 8:00 PM ET on Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu.