The Blues announced Tuesday that they’ve placed winger Jake Neighbours on injured reserve with a right leg injury. He’ll be re-evaluated in five weeks, putting him out of the lineup through at least Dec. 2. They did not immediately announce a recall to fill his roster spot.
Neighbours was absent for Monday’s loss to the Penguins with what the team previously labeled a lower-body issue, and he carried only a day-to-day designation. It’s clear now that was a bit of smoke and mirrors as he underwent further evaluation. The team said he suffered the injury in Saturday’s loss to the Red Wings. He didn’t leave the contest, in which he had two of St. Louis’ four goals, but did appear to favor his right leg after losing an edge and sliding awkwardly into the boards later in the game.
Very little has gone right for the Blues this season. Losing Neighbours, who has a team-leading six goals and was finishing at a red-hot 50% clip, won’t change that slide of bad luck. The 23-year-old is beginning his fifth NHL season since being drafted in the first round in 2020 and has been stapled to the Blues’ top line with Robert Thomas to start the year. When deployed with Pavel Buchnevich on their right flank, they’ve controlled play well with a 51.9 xGF% and 50.6 CF%, per MoneyPuck. Poor goaltending has still led them to be outscored 5-4 and for Neighbours to post a minus-four rating despite his individual success, accounting for 22.2% of the goals the Blues have scored this season.
While that one-in-two finishing rate is unsustainable, the writing was on the wall for a breakout campaign from Neighbours in 2025-26. He’s put together back-to-back 20-goal campaigns and hit a career-best 46 points while playing all 82 games last season. Getting more pucks on net, once he returns in December, will be key to getting him back on that path. Neighbours’ 19.7 shooting percentage since the beginning of 2023-24 is ninth in the league among skaters with at least 100 shots on goal during that time, but he’s only averaged 1.55 shots on goal per game for his career.
The Blues were also without Thomas in last night’s loss due to an upper-body injury. He’s still only listed as day-to-day, but for the time being, the Blues are without the two most consistent members of their top line to open the campaign. Jimmy Snuggerud and Pius Suter were elevated from third-line duties to skate with Buchnevich last night. It’s unclear if that will continue into tonight’s rematch against Detroit or if head coach Jim Montgomery will shuffle his lines further in the wake of three straight regulation losses.