Tonight, the 3-2-1 St. Louis Blues will have their seventh game of the season in a matchup against the 5-2-0 Utah Mammoth. The Blues have struggled, but maybe a returning veteran bottom-sixer can give them some juice: Oskar Sundqvist is back in the lineup.
Sundqvist missed the start of the season with a lower-body injury, and the expectation is that he will join Nick Bjugstad (who's facing his old team tonight, by the way) and Nathan Walker on the fourth line. Hopefully, head coach Jim Montgomery can set and forget that line, as the rest of the forward group has undergone quite a bit of tinkering ahead of this evening's game. Montgomery, for his part, seems thrilled to have Sundqvist back in the lineup, saying that he brings a "warrior mentality" and commends him for being someone who's hard to play against.
Last season, Sundqvist played in 67 games for the Blues, registering six goals, 14 assists, and 20 points in the process, and seven of those points came on the power play. Sundqvist isn't known as an offensive dynamo, so it's unlikely he'll fix the Blues' anemic scoring to start the season, but his strength along the boards and winning puck battles could help the Blues maintain some possession in the offensive zone and generate some scoring chances.
The Blues have quite a number of players who can fill out the bottom six of their roster, so it's not a guarantee that Sundqvist will get every game from here on out. Having an extra option is never a bad thing, though, and it's good to have him back in the lineup.