St. Louis Blues Unveil 2018-19 Schedule
The NHL unveiled the 2018-19 schedule today and Crunch Time has your look at who the Blues will face and when.
The season starts on October 4th when the Winnipeg Jets visit newly named Enterprise Center. The homestand continues with a Saturday night tilt with the rival Chicago Blackhawks.
The visit is the first of two with Chicago in the month as the Hawks close out October for the Blues. Unfortunately this will be the last time the home fans see Chicago the rest of the season as the next three matchups are in Chicago. On top of that the Blues and Hawks play four of their five games by November 14th and don't see each other again until April 3rd.
The Blues won't be giving much thanks in November when they have probably their toughest stretch of the season. Nashville hosts the Blues on November 21st, then after Thanksgiving, the Preds travel to St. Louis to play on the 23rd. The next night the Jets are back in town for whats always a heavy hitting matchup.
2018 ends and 2019 begins with three premier games. Sydney Crosby and the Penguins visit St. Louis on December 29th, the Rangers help close out the year with a visit on New Years Eve and the defending Stanley Cup Champion Capitals are in town January 3rd. It will be interesting to see what kind of reaction TJ Oshie receives in his first visit as a Cup Champion.
January is the Blues best chance to pile up points in any way possible as the face Eastern Conference teams in 8 of their 12 games. The East has been ripe pickings for the Blues in years past and a strong month could catapult them up the standings rather quickly. 7 of the 12 games will be on the road though so that will add some difficulty.
For the second time this season the Blues and Nashville will play a home and home series. February 9th the Blues host Nashville and then will travel to the country music capital the next day. The Preds also visit February 26th for their final meeting of the season.
Detroit's now once a year visit to St. Louis comes on March 21st and Vegas makes its second trip of the year to St. Louis 4 days later. March and April only feature 3 divisional games which is very odd for a playoff stretch run. The Blues wrap up the season with two games at home, April 4th vs Philadelphia and April 6th vs Vancouver.
Enterprise Center will be rocking a lot this season as the schedule boasts 19 weekend games, 12 on Saturdays including 3 afternoon games. The Blues also get a very comfortable 7 game homestand October 25th through November 11th and their longest road trip is five games January 21st through February 7th.
By no means is this schedule easy but the way it sets up gives the Blues plenty of chances to collect points when they need to and put themselves back into the playoffs after missing out last year. They will also have to build on their success in back to back games as they will embark on 14 sets of them this upcoming season.
What games are you looking forward to? Let us know and you could be featured on air on the next Crunch Time with Joe and Wags.
