What are the St. Louis Blues getting in their newest goalie, Love Härenstam?

Love Härenstam (Loo-Ve HAIR-en-stam) is the most recent addition for the Blues in terms of young goaltenders to develop. Taken in the 6th round of the 2025 NHL Draft at 179th overall, this prospect has Steen's keen eye for European players written all over it. While he shares the shortest height title with fellow prospect Colten Ellis, Blues fans may be very excited for the specific style he plays when he mans the crease.

Of the three goaltending styles — the traditional Stand-up goalie, who plays more on their feet; the Butterfly goalie, who prefers to play low in the butterfly position; and the Hybrid goalie, who blends both styles — Härenstam plays the Butterfly. Modern and well-known goalies that fans will be familiar with when thinking of butterfly goalies are Henrik Lundqvist, Carey Price, Marc-Andre Fleury, Pekka Rinne, Sergei Bobrovsky, and Braden Holtby. For the goalies that are currently in the Blues Organization, Stanley Cup winner Jordan Binnington and Colten Ellis both play a similar style to Härenstam.

Save by Härenstam during the 2025 World Juniors semi-finals.

Some of the best attributes currently for Love's game are his explosive lateral movements in the crease and overall athleticism. Other aspects of his game that are worth noting are his quick glove and his vision, even with traffic in front of him, which shows that his overall awareness is very high. Over the next few years, he will need to improve his rebound control against faster, harder shots and continue developing his puck-tracking abilities.

Over the past year, the Blues had been in steady contact with the goaltender — something he mentioned in an interview published on July 9, 2025, by hockeysverige.se, which you can check out here. ( I would recommend having an extension that translates the page, as the site does not have a built-in code for translations.)

"Love Härenstam i St. Louis Blues-dräkten. Foto: Ronnie Rönnkvist." Love Härenstam in a St. Louis Blues jersey. Photo: Ronnie Rönnkvist.

In the interview, he mentions that when he was drafted, he soon received a welcome message from Blues Forward and fan favorite Oskar Sundqvist, on being drafted to the Blues, as well as messages from Philip Broberg and Theo Lindstein. He also talked about how, while it was too close to a time crunch to make the development camp the Blues had for prospects directly after the Draft, he was going to meet up with members of the Blues organization when it came time for the U20 tournament, which will be held in the United States later this year.

While he trains in Sweden with other NHL prospects and players, such as Anton Frondell (CHI 2025 3rd OVA), William and Victor Eklund (SJS 2021 7th OVA & NYI 2025 16th OVA), and Noah Östlund (BUF 2022 16th OVA), he remains focused on this upcoming season, where he has signed to play for Södertälje ("suh-dər-TEL-yeh") in Hockeyallsvenskan, the 2nd tier of professional ice hockey in Sweden.

One of the main reasons he mentioned choosing this specific club in Sweden was to get dedicated full-time play so that he has the best chance to continue to develop his game. He also believes that Södertälje has the tools to make their way back up to the 1st tier of the SHL with his help. A note for North American readers: Most European leagues have relegation and promotion systems for ice hockey, as they do for football or soccer, to Americans.

If Sweden selects him for the upcoming 2026 World Juniors tournament — known in Sweden as the J20 World Cup — he would welcome the opportunity and is committed to working as hard as possible to earn the call-up for his home country. For now, he will be in tandem with 23-year-old Oliver Håkanson, a goaltender who was not drafted by any team in the NHL. Even so, a player five years his senior in terms of playing time will have a well-adjusted point of view.