Philip Broberg is no longer an unknown commodity in St. Louis. Nor is St. Louis foreign to Broberg, now, either.
Thirteen months after joining the Blues via splashy offer sheets targeting himself and fellow former Oiler Dylan Holloway, Broberg is more comfortable in his surroundings.
“The biggest difference is I’m a little bit more comfortable with the guys,” Broberg said. “I’ve been here for a year now, got used to the city, to the staff, my teammates, too. Kind of just getting to know everybody. Last year’s season made it a little bit easier for sure.”
Having a breakout year helps, too.
Last season, Broberg played top-four minutes for the entirety of the season, save for 14 games he missed due to injury, illness and personal reasons. He had 29 points in 68 games while averaging 20:30 of ice time. When Broberg had four points on March 25 against Montreal, he became just the sixth Blues defenseman in the last 20 years with a four-point game.
Blues coach Jim Montgomery said Broberg “grew in how aggressive he was offensively and defensively.”
“Offensively, he tended to take the open ice, which is usually outside ice,” Montgomery said. “With his gifts, we really wanted him to work — especially through the neutral zone, coming out of the d-zone and then in the offensive zone — getting inside dots. With his skating ability off the rush, it really opens up stuff. Now he can skate outside, now he’s in a more dangerous area than if you skate up the boards.”
Broberg, drafted eighth overall in 2019 by Edmonton, has offensive upside in his skillset, but has shown more as a two-way defenseman capable of also handling himself in the defensive zone.
“I think it all starts by me playing on my toes,” Broberg said. “I think that’s when I play my best hockey, when I’m aggressive and I play on my toes. When I see an opportunity, I jump on it and play on my instincts. Also, they talked to me and I want to become a little bit more offensive for sure.”
Broberg is expected to play on the second pair again this season with Justin Faulk, a defensive pairing that was the team’s best one early on and acted as the de facto top pair when Colton Parayko injured his knee in March.
During the preseason opener in Dallas on Saturday night, Broberg skated alongside Logan Mailloux, the newly acquired right-handed defenseman from Montreal. Broberg is 24 and Mailloux is 22, so the pairing could be one in the future, but Blues fans will likely have to wait for that to become a reality in the regular season.
“I think I grew a lot as a player last year,” Broberg said. “I felt like I had a good start to the season. Obviously, I had a little injury there and dealing with coming back from a break with the injury. I think I grew as a player and grew as a person, and I’d like to bring that to this year.”
Carbonneau gets another look
When the Blues played the Blue Jackets on Sunday in Columbus, there was only one carryover from the lineup that played in Dallas on Saturday night: Justin Carbonneau.
Carbonneau, the team’s 2025 first-round pick, scored the Blues’ only goal during a 2-1 shootout loss to the Stars as he found the back of the net on the power play. In Dallas, Carbonneau played on the top line with Dalibor Dvorsky and Dylan Holloway.
“You know what I love about the kid is he loves to play hockey,” Montgomery said. “He loves to be on the ice. And you know he loves to score goals. He’s trying always to figure out where he can go to get the puck to score. There’s areas of his game, naturally, that he’s got to get better. He loves to go to the open ice, which is outside the dots. He’s got to get inside the dots. He’s got to become more like the classic goal scorers we’ve seen here: the Brett Hulls, the Brendan Shananhans, (Keith) Tkachuks. Those people score goals inside the dots.”
Carbonneau has taken advantage of every opportunity he’s been given so far in St. Louis: impressing during July’s development camp, then scoring in the first game of the prospect tournament and the first game of preseason.
“He’s got high-end hockey sense, that he does,” Montgomery said. “In junior hockey, you get used to having to get the puck to make something happen. Now, he has guys that think the game like him, he’s got to trust that if he just gets open, now he’s getting a grade-A from inside the dots, the one-timers and stuff.”
Neighbours rejoins team
Blues forward Jake Neighbours was back in St. Louis on Sunday after missing the first three days of training camp for personal reasons. Neighbours did not participate in practice, but instead skated with Juraj Pekarcik after the two sessions were over. Neighbours is expected to join practice on Tuesday.
Pekarcik has not practiced during camp because of an injury he suffered in the Tom Kurvers Prospect Showcase in Minnesota.
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Matthew DeFranks | Post-Dispatch
Hockey reporter
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