ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - The 2023-24 NHL regular season officially begins Tuesday, but while the St. Louis Blues won't their first game until Thursday, the team did begin the new season by officially announcing their 23-man roster to begin the season.
The Blues will go with 13 forwards and 8 defenseman to begin the season with Jordan Binnington and Joel Hofer will serve as the team's goaltenders.
Among the newcomers include forward Kevin Hayes, who was acquired in a trade with the Philadelphia Flyers, forward Nikita Alexandrov, defenseman Tyler Tucker, and goaltender Hofer.
From an overall roster perspective, there were no real surprises on the roster. The Blues were widely expected to keep Tucker on the roster as he was regularly featured in the team last year and there was no chance of the team putting defenseman Scott Perunovich on waivers despite the latter's injury history.
The odd man out of the situation was Calle Rosen, who had a career season last year with 18 points, a plus-minus of 19 and a point share of 4.9. Rosen went unclaimed on waivers and will start the season in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Alexandrov, Tucker and Hofer have been longtime members of the Blues prospect pipeline for the last couple years. Alexandrov was the Blues second-round draft pick back in 2019, Hofer and Tucker were the team's fourth and seventh-round drafts picks respectively, back in 2018.
All three players did spend time with the Blues last year, with Alexandrov and Tucker both playing nearly 30 games with the team last year while Hofer had six starts behind the crease, winning three games in limited action.
