"I want to play every game. Obviously [needed to] take care of some little things," MacKinnon said on Sunday of sitting out the four contests he missed at the end of the campign. "It wasn't anything major, I just wanted to be healthy come Game 1. Got some rest and some good treatment, and I'm feeling good."
Saad, a two-time Stanley Cup champion (2013 and 2015) with the Chicago Blackhawks, last played on April 24 in St. Louis, missing the final 11 contests with a lower-body injury. He leads all players on the Avalanche roster with 81 games of playoff experience.
Rookie defenseman Conor Timmins will also be in the lineup after he missed the third period of the Avs' final outing of the year on Thursday. He collected two assists in the contest and made a total of 31 appearances for Colorado in the campaign, notching seven helpers which included three in the final three matchups of the season.
Goaltender Philipp Grubauer will be in the crease at puck drop and backed up by Jonas Johansson. Grubauer appeared in a career-high 40 games (39 starts), fifth in the NHL, and finished the regular season tied for the league lead in shutouts (seven), second in wins (30) and was third in goals-against average (1.95), all career bests.
It is just the second time the Avalanche and Blues have met in the postseason, as Colorado defeated St. Louis in five games during the 2001 Western Conference Final. They also met in one round-robin game during the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs qualifiers, as Nazem Kadri scored with 0.1 seconds left in regulation to give the Avs a 2-1 victory last August.
The Avs finished 5-3-0 against the Blues during the 2020-21 regular season, 3-1-0 at home.
Below is the Avalanche's projected lineup based on the forward combinations and defensive pairings from Sunday's practice. They are subject to change.
Forwards
92 Gabriel Landeskog - 29 Nathan MacKinnon - 96 Mikko Rantanen
95 Andre Burakovsky - 91 Nazem Kadri - 72 Joonas Donskoi
20 Brandon Saad - 17 Tyson Jost - 13 Valeri Nichushkin
18 Alex Newhook - 41 Pierre-Edouard Bellemare - 37 J.T. Compher
Defensemen
7 Devon Toews - 8 Cale Makar
27 Ryan Graves - 49 Samuel Girard
24 Patrik Nemeth - 22 Conor Timmins
Goaltenders
31 Philipp Grubauer
35 Jonas Johansson
Scratches: Dennis Gilbert, Liam O'Brien, Jacob MacDonald, Jayson Megna, Dan Renouf, Kiefer Sherwood, Carl Soderberg
Injury Report: Bowen Byram (upper body), Matt Calvert (upper body), Devan Dubnyk (returning from COVID protocol), Pavel Francouz (lower body), Erik Johnson (upper body), Logan O'Connor (lower body)
The St. Louis Blues will be have Vladimir Tarasenko back in their lineup for Game 1 but will be without David Perron. Tarasenko missed eight of the last nine games of the regular season with a lower-body injury and last played on May 3. In total, the forward appeared in 24 outings and recorded 14 points (four goals, 10 assists).
Perron, who led the team this year with 58 points (19 goals, 39 assists) has been in the league's COVID protocol since Saturday afternoon.
Head coach Craig Berube said that defenseman Marco Scandella will play in Game 1 after not participating in the team's morning practice while Vince Dunn, who last played on April 24, will not dress for the game.
Jordan Binnington is expected to be between the pipes for the Blues. He went 18-14-8 in 2020-21, including a 3-4-0 with a .909 save percentage and 2.89 goals-against average in seven outings against Colorado.
Below is St. Louis' projected lineup for Game 1, courtesy of
StLouisBlues.com
.
Forwards
17 Jaden Schwartz - 90 Ryan O'Reilly - 10 Brayden Schenn
49 Ivan Barbashev - 21 Tyler Bozak - 91 Vladimir Tarasenko
68 Mike Hoffman - 18 Robert Thomas - 25 Jordan Kyrou
13 Kyle Clifford - 12 Zach Sanford - 9 Sammy Blais
Defensemen
47 Torey Krug - 72 Justin Faulk
6 Marco Scandella - 55 Colton Parayko
77 Niko Mikkola - 41 Robert Bortuzzo
Goaltenders
50 Jordan Binnington
35 Ville Husso
