Halfway through the preseason, predicting the opening night roster for the Columbus Blue Jackets

Now that the preseason has passed the halfway mark for the Columbus Blue Jackets, it's getting a little easier to see what head coach Dean Evason has planned for his lineup this season. Or is it?

The team has made just a handful of cuts so far, with no surprises in that regard. But, even though the training camp roster still sits at 51 players, the line combinations happening within the games hint at the opening night lineup.

Last night, the Jackets hosted the Pittsburgh Penguins in their fourth game of the preseason. Looking at the top two forward lines, it's not difficult to see that this could be the team's top-six to start the season:

Last year, we were treated to that top line of Dmitri Voronkov, Sean Monahan, and Kirill Marchenko for most of the season. They were highly effective, and keeping them together makes a lot of sense.

What is interesting here is that second line. Adam Fantilli and Kent Johnson looked to be developing strong chemistry at the end of last season. By adding Boone Jenner, they balance out this line with a little more grit and two-way prowess.

On paper, I could see this working. Both of those lines can score. There is a good mix of speed, skill, size, grit, and defensive awareness. If that's the way the team starts the season, it's really hard to argue with this plan.

What does that leave for the bottom six? That's a little tougher to tell, as the team has used a wider variety of combinations with the forwards who are in the mix for roster spots here. I think we could be in for something like this:

Sillinger - Coyle - Chinakhov
Wood - Lundestrom - Olivier
Aston-Reese

This is what makes the most sense to me. We've talked at length this preseason about Cole Sillinger, who we believe will have a bit of a breakout year offensively. He's shown good chemistry with Yegor Chinakhov in the past.

By adding a veteran pivot in Charlie Coyle, GM Don Waddell has given Evason a potentially effective third scoring line. Sign me up.

This also gives them a pretty apparent fourth line, with newcomers Miles Wood and Isac Lundestrom alongside the rugged Mathieu Olivier. Wood is a big, speedy winger who can forecheck. Lundestrom is a defensive minded center who can be responsible on this line.

Like this top six, this bottom six works on paper. Evason can also filter in Zach Aston-Reese if he feels the need for a better penalty killer at any point.

On defense...

Defensively, it's a little bit murky because we have not yet seen Denton Mateychuk on the ice this preseason. And, Jake Christiansen is looking much improved, which might make the decisions here a little bit tougher than we might have assumed.

I expect the top pairing of Zach Werenski and Dante Fabbro to remain intact, assuming they are both healthy. They were very good together last year, and there's no reason to break them up.

Throughout this preseason, we've seen Ivan Provorov paired with Damon Severson, but I do not see that carrying over to the regular season. We've seen that pairing in action before, and it's been proven again this fall: it does not work.

Splitting those two between the second and third pairing seems like the wisest decision. One player we have not seen yet in this preseason is veteran Erik Gudbranson, who will likely reprise his role on the third pairing (when healthy).

This means that Mateychuk and Christiansen may be battling with each other for ice time, when this roster is at full health. Mateychuk could return to full practice as soon as this weekend, so expect this battle to start heating up. This will make for some really tough decisions.

Ultimately, I think it comes down to Severson or Gudbranson as the healthy scratch to start the year. If Mateychuk is fully healthy, he will likely resume playing with Provorov on the second pair.

Jake Christiansen has simply been better than Damon Severson thus far, and if we're basing this roster off of merit, he's earned this spot. We'll see what Erik Gudbranson can do when he gets his chance in the lineup. This is a battle that may go right down to the wire.

And in goal...

We explored the scenarios that could come up in goal yesterday, so the deep dive is already done. I think the most likely outcome here is that the team starts the year with three goaltenders, in this order:

Jet Greaves
Elvis Merzlikins
Ivan Fedotov

Simply put, Jet Greaves has earned the right to be this team's opening night starting goaltender. Unless something drastic changes over the next week and a half, I expect to see him between the pipes when the puck drops on October 9th.

The real battle here is for the backup position, and early on, Ivan Fedotov has looked pretty darn good. Still, Elvis Merzlikins has a contract that pretty much dictates he will be on the opening night roster.

So, out of fear of losing Fedotov via waivers, I think Waddell and Evason have their hands tied a little bit and will be forced to keep three goaltenders to further evaluate. Until they feel comfortable that Fedotov can pass through waivers, or they decide that it's time to move on from Merzlikins, this will be the battle that draws the most attention.

We'll re-evaluate these predictions after the next slate of preseason games, and keep you up to date throughout each roster move made ahead of the start of the regular season.