Blues Visit 'Canes

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The Blues face Carolina tonight at the RBC (Royal Bank of Canada) Center in the first of the team's third set of back-to-back games on consecutive nights.  Andy Murray's team swept Detroit earlier this month in the teams' first set before settling for a split last weekend, beating Minnesota before losing to Dallas. The Blues are slated to play 18 sets of games on back-to-back nights this season. The Note will entertain Phoenix tomorrow night at 7:00 from Scottrade Center.

Rookie defenseman Alex Pietrangelo is expected to play again this evening after netting his first NHL goal in Saturday's loss to the Stars. He'll likely be paired with offensive blueliner Carlo Colaiacovo who appears to be okay following a hit from Dallas' Steve Ott that ultimately forced him to leave the game permanently with an "upper body" injury.

Chris Mason will start in nets for the first time since Friday's victory over the Wild. Mason has a save percentage of .906 and a goals against average of 2.82 on top of a 2-3-1 record. Carolina's Cam Ward has played every game for the 2-5-3 Hurricanes this year and will likely get the nod again tonight. Like the 4-4-1 Blues, the 'Canes haven't played since a loss on Saturday. Ward shutout the Note last season and also earned a 2-1 win as Carolina swept a two-game set from St. Louis. Tonight's matchup is the only scheduled meeting between the two teams this season.

The Hurricanes have dropped a league-high six-straight games since their overtime loss to the Wild. Former Blues first-round pick (1988) and 39-year old forward and captain Rod Brind' Amour has been moved to the wing as 'Canes head coach Paul Maurice, like Blues' bench boss Andy Murray has switched things up a bit looking for enhanced offense.

Murray has restructured his top line to have Keith Tkachuk center left wing Andy McDonald and right wing (shifting from center) David Backes, according to Jeremy Rutherford of the Post-Dispatch. Patrik Berglund will center Paul Kariya and Brad Boyes. Jay McClement will center B-J Crombeen and David Perron. Yesterday's call up from Peoria, Yan Stastny will make his 2009-2010 Blues' debut, centering Brad Winchester and Cam Janssen.

Murray is also making the changes due to three of his wingers, T-J Oshie, Alex Steen and D-J King being out with injuries. Oshie is recovering from an apendectomy, Steen has a fractured right wrist and King has a fractured right hand.

Both teams have are experiencing outages on their respective power plays. The Blues are scoreless in their last 16 attempts and rank 24th in the NHL's PP rankings. The Hurricanes are ranked 25th.

The first puck drops at 6:05 tonight in NC.

TPC