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Three Takeaways From Blues' 6-1 Win Against Canadiens
ST.
LOUIS – It’s getting to the point of running out of superlatives
to describe the St. Louis Blues these days.
The
Blues aren’t just on a heater, they’re blow torch scorching hot,
extending their season-high seventh straight win when they blew out
the Montreal Canadiens, 6-1, on Tuesday at Enterprise Center.
Going
in, this was a matchup of the two hottest teams since the 4 Nations
Face-Off, and each team had vaulted itself into the second wild card
from each respective conference.
But
from the opening puck drop, it wasn’t even close.
The
Blues (38-28-7), 14-2-2 their past 18 games, including 13-2-2 since
the break, put up the first nine shots on goal against Sam
Montembeault and it was as if the Canadiens (33-28-9), who were 8-1-4
since the break, couldn’t even break out of their own end, and when
they did, the puck was maybe in the Blues’ zone for literally
seconds.
It
was that kind of game for at least the first half of it, and Blues
coach Jim Montgomery saw it coming.
“Yes
we did (set the tone in the first), but I’ve go to be honest, the
way we practiced in the morning skate, I don’t usually put much
into the morning skate, but we had the day off and I could really see
we had juice,” Montgomery said. “I thought it was the crispest.
“I
remember Jimmy Johnson with the Dallas Cowboys once getting ready to
play in the NFC Championship against the 49ers and he said, after
they practiced so well, he said, ‘We’re going to be really good
tomorrow.’ And they blew the 49ers out. And I just had that feeling
that we were going to be really good tonight, and that first 30
minutes of the game was probably the best hockey we’ve played all
year.”
And
what does Montgomery notice?
“There’s
just a pace and a purpose to what they’re doing and they’re just
doing it,” he said. “Naturally, and there’s smiles on their
face and they’re loving doing things right. Really professional and
they’re loving it, and they went out and played like that.”
Philip
Broberg had a career night with a goal and three assists, Robert
Thomas matched him with a goal and three assists of his own, Dylan
Holloway extended his point streak to eight with a goal and an
assist, and Jordan Kyrou, Alexandre Texier and Zack Bolduc each
scored, while Jordan Binnington won his fourth straight start with 24
saves.
It’s
a confident group, one that just continues to grow larger and larger.
They’ve outscored the opposition 34-10 in this run and have won
seven in a row on home ice as well.
“We're
playing really confident right now,” Holloway
said.
“I think we've got a recipe that works and a game plan that
everybody believes in. Guys are playing for each other, and it's a
good vibe in here for sure.
“I
think that's just a testament to our work ethic. I think guys are
putting the work in on the ice, off the ice, in the gym. We're dialed
in in practice, too. And the biggest thing is, we're just working
smart in those games. We're getting pucks to the goal line, we're
playing to our team identity and good results have been happening.”
All
the focus has been on the Blues and the second wild card, which is a
four-point margin over the Calgary Flames, five over the Vancouver
Canucks and eight over the Utah Hockey Club.
But
how about the first wild card? The Blues all of the sudden trail the
Minnesota Wild, who have lost two in a row, by just two points for
the top wild card.
“Again,
I don’t think that we’ve looked at it that way,” Montgomery
said. “I think we’ve just looked at controlling our own games. I
have not had a conversation with a player about Calgary, about
Minnesota, about Vancouver, about Utah. I’m sure they’re talking
amongst themselves like us coaches talk amongst ourselves, but when
we’re all together, it’s been real business-like about the
present.”
Here
are Tuesday’s Three Takeaways:
*
Setting the tone in the first period – About the only aspect of the
game the Canadiens – at least early – were better than the Blues
were face-offs. Other than that, it was a clinic on puck possession,
retrievals, forechecking, cycling … you name it.
Canadiens
goalie Sam Montembeault, who was replaced in the third period by
Jakub Dobes, kept Montreal in it early, but a 2-1 Blues lead probably
should have been bigger, thanks to a late goal in the waning seconds.
Kyrou
extended his point streak to seven games (seven goals, five assists)
when he made it 1-0 at 18:07. It came not long after Holloway laid a
big check on Canadiens defenseman Alexandre Carrier to set the tone
for the sequence of events that led to Kyrou buying time and finding
a lane to shoot through traffic.
And
even though Nick Suzuki tied the game with a nice tip of his own to
tie the game 1-1 at 18:54, Holloway got it back with a tip goal of
his own with 5.1 seconds left in the opening period.
“I
don't know where it ranks -- best hits -- but I know I got blown up
the shift before,” Holloway
said.
“I was a little angry going into that shift and it just happened
perfectly there. Definitely probably one of my bigger ones.”
The
Blues outshot the Canadiens 14-5 in the opening period and it was one
of those where the shot clock reflected the play.
*
Rush attack lethal again – The Blues are known as a dangerous rush
team, and when opponents’ coaches and players talk, they usually
mention it.
Well,
when Thomas made it 3-1 at 3:21 of the second period, it came with
more open ice during 4-on-4 play, and it came with speed, a cutback
to the top of the left circle and a perfect shot top shelf.
Then
another rush play, this time by the third line that caused havoc with
a cycle game with Oskar Sundqvist, Mathieu Joseph, Texier and Cam
Fowler, who had two assists, working the puck in the zone before
Fowler’s shot from the high slot created a rebound and Texier there
to collect the loose change for his second goal in as many games at
9:09 to make it 4-1.
“The
team’s playing really well,” Texier said. “I think we found our
game defensively, offensively. We’ve just got to keep going now.
“You’ve
just got to work hard and stay positive. When you get a chance,
you’ve got to do your best. I’m trying to just play my game and
help the team to win.
“I’ve
seen (the confidence) from outside and inside, from not playing. It’s
pretty special to be honest. The group, how we approach the game, how
we play the game. We’re down, we’re up, we play the same way for
60 minutes. It’s been fun.”
*
Broberg, Holloway affect – When the Blues made the offer sheets for
the two Edmonton Oilers in August, the hope was that it would
expedite the retool.
It’s
safe to say that it’s skyrocketed at a much quicker pace than even
the Blues expected.
Broberg
has not only been so fundamentally sound defensively, as he was again
on Tuesday killing Montreal play after play to the tune of a plus-4,
but he’s also contributing on the offensive side; he now has six
points the past four games (two goals, four assists).
“I'm
just trying to play game and that's a two-way game. I take a lot of
pride in being good defensively, but when I see the opportunity to
jump, I try to jump as well.
“I
think [Montgomery’s]
trusting all the guys in the locker room that if you go up, somebody
will take care of you behind you. I think it's been good so far, and
we've just got to keep this thing going.”
Montgomery
said, “He’s
such a gifted player, he loves the game of hockey. There’s a thirst
for knowledge, wants to get better every time he’s watching video,
he’s locked in. The part of his game that’s really progressed is
his offensive side of the game. He attacks really good areas now, he
plays high percentage hockey. I think it’s only going to continue.
I know he had four points tonight, but it will continue to get better
in his career. He’s so young.”
For
Holloway, whose now on a team-high eight-game point streak (four
goals, nine assists), it was a continuation of doing the little
things off the puck that fuel his offensive game.
The
hit on Carrier, to set up a goal, the constant harassment of hounding
the puck, playing physical, working hard to win pucks, back-tracking,
being sound defensively, that leads to his success at the offensive
side.
“Just
every game you've got to be consistent with that,” Holloway said.
“You can't get complacent and think it's going to come easier some
games. Sometimes you've got to put the nose down and go to work in
the corners and get pucks back. When I'm playing with these special
players like ‘Schenner’ and ‘Rouzy’, I've just got to get
them the puck and when we get the puck in the O-zone, we click pretty
well. Yeah, I try to implement that in my game for sure.”
Montgomery
is seeing the maturation of a complete player.
“I
just think he’s such a confident player right now,” he said. “The
physicality is just becoming more and more and he’s realizing how
physically dominating he can be physically but also offensively and
defensively. It’s impressive to watch. His confidence just seems to
gain layers.”
These
are two players that made it to the end last season with Edmonton,
even in a limited role, that gained them a wealth of confidence.
“I
think that any time you go to the Stanley Cup finals, you gain a lot
of confidence,” Montgomery said. “You’re playing in big moments
and you’re playing at the highest intensity possible, and they both
had success. I think that gave them a lot of confidence, and then
they’re really committed athletes, and the opportunity that they’ve
been given here her been amplified … that they would not have
gotten, especially Holloway would not have gotten that opportunity.
Not for a couple years anyway. You combine all those things, I’m
just really grateful that they’re Blues.”
Broberg
sent Montembeault packing for the night with a wrister off the
goalie’s glove at 10:12 of the third for a 5-1 lead, and Bolduc’s
power-play goal from the slot at 18:02 capped a perfect night for the
Blues.
“I
see a team that’s getting more and more confident,” Montgomery
said. “We see it in the way we practice, we see it in the way we
walk into the room or we get on a plane. It’s good, but we’ve got
to enjoy this and we’ve got to get ready for our next game. We’ve
got a big two-game road trip. That’s been the most impressive part
is how we’ve stayed in the moment. We’re not relishing the past,
the wins. We’re getting focused on the next day.”
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(3-25-25) Canadiens-Blues Gameday Lineup
ST.
LOUIS – Two of the hottest teams as of late in the NHL do battle on
Tuesday when the St. Louis Blues (37-28-7), winners of six in a row,
host the Montreal Canadiens (33-27-9) at 7 p.m. (Matrix-MW,
Victory+, ESPN
101.1-FM).
The
Blues are on their best heater of the season, which includes a 13-2-2
run and want to keep their firm grip on the second wild card in the
Western Conference; they lead the Vancouver Canucks by three points,
Calgary Flames by four points and Utah Hockey Club by six points but
now have the Minnesota Wild, holders of the first wild card, in their
sights, trailing the Wild by just four points.
The
Canadiens 8-1-4
their past 13 games, are 3-0-3 their past six games.
“A
lot of similarities,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said of the Blues
and Canadiens. “Two good goalies, [Nick] Suzuki has been unreal
like [Robert] Thomas has been unreal, the first line is leading like
you want your team to lead and they’re playing real good, committed
offense and defense in all three zones.”
- - -
Blues forward Dylan Holloway, fresh
off being named the NHL’s third star of the week for the week
ending March 23, continues to gain favorable impressions from
teammates and coaches.
“I don’t think there’s an area
that he hasn’t grown,” Montgomery said of Holloway, who had seven
points (one goal, six assists) in four games last week and is on a
seven-game point streak (three goals, eight assists). “He’s
always had that dogged determination to win puck battles and stay on
pucks. I think his physicality has improved, I think his offensive
creativity has improved, his shot-first mentality, and defensively, I
had him out there in a pulled goalie situation because his defensive
habits have augmented so much that the trust level has gone (up). We
can use him in those situations that he just has the physical tools
that will enable you to have success when you’re short in that
situation.”
- - -
Blues defenseman Colton Parayko skated
on Tuesday morning, his first time skating with the team since
injuring his left knee in a 3-2 shootout win against the Los Angeles
Kings on Nov. 5 and having a knee scope.
“I got to be honest, I saw him
twice,” Montgomery said. “When I’m out there, I’m focused on
the team. I know he’s a long ways away. It’s great to have him
out there. It’s just the first step in the recovery process towards
becoming a player for us.
“I was just happy with the pace and
execution of our team.”
- - -
Defenseman Nick Leddy and center Oskar
Sundqvist will return after each missed Sunday’s 4-1 win against
the Nashville Predators with an undisclosed maintenance day.
Leddy will replace Matthew Kessel and
Sundqvist will replace Dalibor Dvorsky, who made his NHL debut on
Sunday.
“I spoke to him before we went out,”
Montgomery said of Dvorsky, who played 10:49. “We were really happy
with his first game in the league, shows his hockey sense, shows his
poise with the puck. Game management was beyond his years as far as
he didn’t complicate the game, he didn’t force anything, allowed
us to play to our identity. Today is an opportunity to be part of a
morning skate, be part of a practice tomorrow, watch the game tonight
and grow and learn about why we’ve had success here recently.
“It’s very tempting to keep him
in, but I think as a coach, you’ve got to reward the guys that have
gotten you here and those guys have battled hard and they’re all
fresh and rested right now so we’re going to go with the horses
that have gotten us here.”
- - -
Pavel Buchnevich (illness) remains out of the lineup, his third straight game missed tonight, but Montgomery said that the forward is getting better.
"Doing better, not a player yet," Montgomery said, who noted it's nothing related to the hit he took in a 4-1 win against the Predators on March 18. "It's something different."
- - -
Blues
Projected Lineup:
Jake
Neighbours-Robert Thomas-Zack Bolduc
Dylan
Holloway-Brayden Schenn-Jordan Kyrou
Mathieu
Joseph-Oskar Sundqvist-Alexandre Texier
Alexey
Toropchenko-Radek Faksa-Nathan Walker
Cam
Fowler-Nick Leddy
Philip
Broberg-Justin Faulk
Ryan
Suter-Tyler Tucker
Jordan
Binnington will start in goal; Joel Hofer will be the backup.
The
healthy scratches include Dalibor Dvorsky and Matthew Kessel. Colton
Parayko (knee) and Pavel Buchnevich (illness) are out.
- - -
Canadiens
Projected Lineup:
Cole
Caufield-Nick Suzuki-Juraj Slafkovsky
Joshua
Roy-Alex Newhook-Patrik Laine
Josh
Anderson-Christian Dvorak-Brendan Gallagher
Emil
Heineman-Jake Evans-Joel Armia
Mike
Matheson-Alexandre Carrier
Jayden
Struble-Lane Hutson
Arber
Xhekaj-David Savard
Sam
Montembeault will start in goal; Jakub Dobes will be the backup.
The
healthy scratch
includes
Michael
Pezzetta. Kaiden Guhle (quad) is
out.
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Blues Forward Named NHL's Third Star Of The Week
ST. LOUIS -- The NHL has announced its three stars of the week for the week ending March 23, and St. Louis Blues forward Dylan Holloway has been named the third star, behind Minnesota Wild goalie Filip Gustavsson and Vegas Golden Knights forward Jack Eichel.
Holloway had seven points (one goal, six assists) in four games, helping the Blues (37-28-7) go 4-0-0 over the past week to vault the team four points clear of the Calgary Flames for the second wild card spot in the Western Conference; the Blues are currently on a six-game winning streak.
Holloway had three assists in a 4-1 win against the Nashville Predators last Tuesday, then on Thursday, he had a goal and an assist in a 4-3 overtime win against the Vancouver Canucks and capped the weekend with an assist in back-to-back wins over the Chicago Blackhawks (4-1) Saturday and Predators (4-1) on Sunday to extend his point streak to seven games (three goals, eight assists). It is tied for the longest active streak in the NHL.
Overall, Holloway led the league with six assists for the week while his seven points shared the lead and his plus-5 rating shared third.
Holloway is third on the Blues with 58 points (23 goals, 35 assists).
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Blues Forward Fined For Cross Checking
ST. LOUIS -- Zack Bolduc didn't hesitate when the St. Louis Blues forward felt like he had to jump in to defend Robert Thomas.
Thomas and Nashville Predators defenseman Nick Blankenburg were on a collision course near center ice, and knee-to-knee contact seemed evident.
But a potentially dangerous situation was avoided. However, Bolduc saw something that appeared to the quick and naked eye was a targeted attempt at the knee and went right after Blankenburg with 6:27 remaining in the third of a 4-1 Blues win.
After a review, Blankenburg was assessed a minor for tripping, but Bolduc was given a five-minute major for cross checking and a game misconduct.
The NHL's Department of Player Safety came down with a ruling on Monday morning that Bolduc was fined for his actions to the tune of $2,248.26, which will go to the Players’ Emergency Assistance Fund.
Whether Blankenburg was trying to target the knee is a debate for whomever, but Thomas was fortunate enough to see the impact was close and was fortunate enough to avoid it, and appreciate the gesture by his teammate.
"Much appreciated," Thomas said. "He's a guy that's really exploded, he's feeling comfortable, he's playing amazing hockey, he's playing the right way. It was nice for him to stick up for me and I definitely owe him.
"Kind of right when I turned, I saw [Blankenburg]. I didn't know which way he was going to try and hit me. I was just able to get out of the way at the last second."
Blues coach Jim Montgomery didn't want to offer his take on the situation but was proud of Bolduc as well for jumping to a teammate's defense.
"I am. We're sticking together," Montgomery said. "Just like the scrum at the net front. We all came in and stuck together when they slashed 'Binner' on the hand."
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Dalibor Dvorsky On Blues, NHL Debut: "I’ve obviously been dreaming about it for a long time. I enjoyed every second of it. It was amazing."
ST.
LOUIS – Dalibor Dvorsky’s father, Dalibor Sr., was all set to
return to his native Slovakia.
The
elder Dvorsky had come to the United States to visit his son, playing
and playing well for the St. Louis Blues’ American Hockey League
team, the Springfield Thunderbirds.
Until
an unexpected change of plans that came on Saturday night.
Instead
of returning to Slovakia, Dvorsky’s father, like Dalibor, were
booking flights to St. Louis, because Dalibor was being summoned to
the NHL for the first time when the Blues recalled the No. 10 pick in
the 2023 NHL Draft.
“It
was awesome. Good timing, because he was about to go back home to
Slovakia today,” Dalibor said of his father. “He was visiting me
in Springfield. Amazing timing that I got called up at this time.
“Yeah,
he had to change the one (flight), but I didn’t think he minded
it.”
Dvorsky
made his Blues debut on Sunday in a 4-1 win against the Nashville
Predators and played 10:40 centering the third line with Mathieu
Joseph and Alexandre Texier.
Dvorsky,
who was having a solid season in Springfield with 43 points (20
goals, 23 assists) in 57 games, including 10 power-play goals, was
needed in St. Louis. With Pavel Buchnevich out with illness and Oskar
Sundqvist banged up needing a maintenance day to recover and Texier,
who was the lone healthy forward, already in the lineup, the Blues
needed reinforcements.
It
was time to give Dvorsky a look.
“It
was awesome,” Dvorsky said. “I’ve obviously been dreaming about
it for a long time. I enjoyed every second of it. It was amazing.
“It
was a little bit of a shock (to get called up), I’m not going to
lie. I didn’t really expect it, but obviously an awesome feeling.
I’m real happy to be here.”
Dvorsky,
who was given Kelly Chase’s pads as player of the game, has been a
highly-anticipated prospect, one of the more highly anticipated ones
since the Blues drafted Robert Thomas in 2017. Once fans got wind
that he would be making his debut on Sunday, they wanted to be there
for his rookie lap.
“The
crowd was amazing. It was awesome, and the first rookie lap also,”
Dvorsky said. “All the guys in the room were great. Unbelievable
experience and I’ll never forget it and also the crowd was amazing.
I loved every second of it.”
For
a first game, Dvorsky seemed to fit in. When the puck touched his
stick, he didn’t get overwhelmed. Instead, he made smart, decisive,
calm plays with it.
“I
liked him,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said. “(He) did really
good. Made plays, moved pucks on first touch, which is a sign. That
play that he makes on the power play that leads to the goal, it’s
high end. It’s a good start to his career.
“He
knew what he was going to do with the puck before he got it. That’s
usually a sign for really good hockey sense.”
When
Texier scored at 16:57 of the first period to give the Blues a 2-0
lead with the power-play goal, Dvorsky started the sequence with a
puck retrieval, moved it to Zack Bolduc in the bumper, who found
Thomas in the left circle before he wired a puck to the low crease
area for Texier to tap in on the backhand.
“Smart,
really patient with the puck,” Thomas said of Dvorsky. “I thought
he showed a lot of poise with it. He made a couple really good
backhand passes and then that power play goal, he’s under pressure,
he makes a calm play to the middle to ‘Boldy’ and those are
things that especially in your first game, to have that kind of
patience is really impressive.”
As
for hockey smarts, they were evident right from the get-go.
“There
was a play that won’t show up on tape, but I’ll explain it,”
Faulk
said after
the game on FDSNMW.
“In the second period, there was a play where the puck was getting
chipped into the neutral zone and all he did was hold up their third
man that was trying to join the rush. He just held him up a little
bit and made it a 2-on-2 (instead of) a 3-on-2. That’s a play
that shows you have some hockey smarts. It’s tough to learn that. A
lot of guys are just worried about the puck, trying to make plays.
It’s a selfless play. It doesn’t help himself at all. But it
makes the (defensemen’s) job and everyone else a lot easier. I was
really impressed to see a play like that happen in his first game.”
Montgomery
told Dvorsky before the game to just do what he does best and not be
something he’s not, which really helped Dvorsky stay composed.
“It
was great that he told me that,” Dvorsky said. “I felt more loose
obviously. The hockey’s different, but I just did my best every
shift to help the team win.”
Including
serve a five-minute major that Bolduc was called for in the third
period for cross checking Nashville defenseman Nick Blankenburg for
what he thought was an attempt to go at Thomas’s knee near center
ice.
“I
didn’t really mind it honestly,” Dvorsky said. “It was
alright.”
Now
that he’s here, and it’s really all up to the Blues how long he
stays here, Dvorsky needs to get up to speed with the NHL game, which
is much faster than that of the AHL.
“It’s
obviously different in the AHL,” he
said.
“I had to adjust to it a little bit. The pace is faster. The
players, the opponents are better. It’s a little different.”
But
Dvorsky seems to have willing teammates there to help with the
process.
“A
lot of guys. The guys were amazing. All of them, they said to play my
game, not to feel any pressure and just enjoy the day,” Dvorsky
said. “The guys made it so much easier. They were really nice to me
and they helped me a lot today.”
And
now that he’s in St. Louis, his dad plans on staying – for the
time being.
“Yeah,
I think so, he’ll probably stay,” Dvorsky said.
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 4-1 Win Against Predators
ST.
LOUIS – When the St. Louis Blues began this hot stretch since the 4
Nations Face-Off break resumed on Feb. 22, they were finishing off
games in convincing fashion, finding their groove and beating teams
going away.
For
the second straight game – and day – the Blues won without their
best, and they won without some of their best players, but the beat
goes on.
Make
it six straight wins now, after finishing off the Nashville Predators
for the second time in six days and by identical scores, 4-1, at
Enterprise Center on Sunday.
The
Blues played the game without Colton Parayko (knee), Pavel Buchnevich
(illness), and they were missing Oskar Sundqvist and Nick Leddy (each
maintenance days) from being dinged up, but the debut of Dalibor
Dvorsky, the No. 10 pick in the 2023 NHL Draft, and addition of
Matthew Kessel into the lineup didn’t deter the Blues (37-28-7)
from moving four points ahead of the Calgary Flames for the second
wild card in the Western Conference, five ahead of the Vancouver
Canucks and six ahead of the Utah Hockey Club.
“When
we’ve been playing well here, every line’s been contributing,”
said Blues defenseman Justin Faulk, who had a goal and an assist and
was a plus-2 in 23:19. “Even if it’s not offensively, they’re
playing well, they’re creating momentum. I think it shows tonight.
“We
started [Radek] Faksa, [Nathan] Walker and ‘Torpo’, they’ve
been very consistent for us. They got a lot of shifts against their
top line to go out there, they play heavy below their goal line and
when you have any line you can do that with, it’s tough on
opponents. They can’t get matchups, works in our favor a little
bit. And yeah as a D-core, we’re confident. We’ve got a lot of
older guys back there, a couple younger guys, but they’re playing
well. They’ve stepped in and they’re doing their job. When you
got two goalies playing behind you as well, that helps the group. It
calms the group. We’re feeling good and hopefully it keeps
rolling.”
Robert
Thomas had three assists, Jake Neighbours had two, and Alexandre
Texier, Jordan Kyrou and Brayden Schenn each scored. Kyrou hit the
30-goal mark for the third straight season in a game the Blues had to
grind, just like Saturday’s 4-1 win over the Chicago Blackhawks.
“It’s
obviously a tough game and
a division rival,” Thomas said. “A very good team and they play
hard. It was important for us to keep the roll going especially on
back to backs and play a smart game. We felt pretty good about it.”
The
Blues spent more time than usual in the penalty box (more on that
below) and were still able to find a way to grind out a win and keep
putting pressure on those teams chasing them.
“A
lot of things happened in that game,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery
said. “It was a frustrating game because we were in the box a lot,
to my dismay, and there’s a lot of whistles so we couldn’t get
any flow going. I could sense frustration, especially from our
forward group but they did a great job in the second period and it’s
just because they couldn’t get in the flow of the game, people
couldn’t get on the ice … but then in the third period again for
four straight games, our third period’s our best period. The way we
manage games now to close the games out, we learned a little bit from
the Vancouver game, but we’re much better at it and it’s just an
opportunity for us to keep growing. You’ve to win different games.
Tonight it was an ugly game to win, but we won it again.”
*
Overcoming uncontrolable circumstances – It’s hard to fathom many
teams overcoming the things the Blues had to overcome in this game.
It
started right at the end of the first period when things got chippy
after Alexey Toropchenko checked Nashville’s Jonathan Marchessault
along the boards, and Matchessault didn’t like it. He took
exception and took not one, not two, but three slashes at the Blues
forward, and then took a run at Philip Broberg after a whistle that
brought all 10 players into a scrum.
Well,
seconds before, Michael McCarron, who drilled Buchnevich in the head
on Tuesday in Nashville, was tripped behind the Blues net (I think
Jordan Binnington, who was terrific, by the way, clipped McCarron and
not Broberg).
So
out of all that, referees Brian Pochmara and Brandon Blandina, who
began their series of blunders throughout this game, issued
Marchessault with a roughing minor – that’s it! -- and Broberg
got called for tripping and Toropchenko for roughing.
The
Predators came out of that with a power play and how, nobody but the
officials know how.
“I
don’t know how we ended up shorthanded at the end of the first
either,” Montgomery said. “[Marchessault] could have had four
minors on the situation, my opinion. I get the luxury of looking at
everything afterwards.”
Montgomery
was so upset that he came onto the Blues bench long before the
resumption of the second period to have a chat with the officials.
“Just
asking what they saw and then tell them what we saw,” Montgomery
said.
The
Blues were ahead 2-0, but Filip Forsberg would score on the ensuing
power play to make it a 2-1 game just 1:04 into the second period and
make it a game.
There
were a number of calls – those happen all the time – that were
missed and it happens in such a fast game, so we’re pointing out
the most blatant ones, and another came seconds into the third period
when Thomas thought he had put the Blues up 3-1 after Predators
goalie Justus Annunen couldn’t cleanly handle Faulk’s flip-in on
goal. Thomas was there to pry the loose puck and put it into the net
for what should have been a 3-1 lead, but Blandina made the poor
decision of blowing the play dead when it was clear the puck wasn’t
covered.
“I
don’t know. I was a little confused to be honest, but when the
whistle’s blown, the whistle’s blown,” Thomas said. “That’s
all I got.”
In
a game of this magnitude with the points so critical to the Blues, it
could have been a disastrous result, but in the end, they found a way
to overcome what wasn’t in their control when it came to whistles.
“Obviously
it’s frustrating, but I think we did a great job responding in the
third,” Thomas said. “We came out with a purpose and we kept
going and extended the lead. That stuff’s really important,
especially when maybe the first or second are a little frustrating.”
Faulk
added, “It
was a tough game. We’ve had a tough stretch. Not making any
excuses. If anything, I’m proud of the group and how we were able
to get it done tonight. When you’re a good hockey team, you have to
win those games. You have to find ways to do it and dig in. It wasn’t
our prettiest, that’s for sure, but we found ways to limit them a
bit. Binner played great, penalty kill did a great job and proud of
the guys to get the two points tonight.”
*
Quick start to game – Each team was coming off a back to back and
it was going to be a question of who could get the lead and try to
dictate the pace with tired, weary legs kicking in.
The
Blues were able to score twice, with Kyrou making it 1-0 at 12:13 of
the first period when Neighbours attacked the zone 1-on-3 but
feathered a pass to Thomas coming into the zone. He quickly dropped
it to Kyrou, who beat Annunen off the post on the short side, perhaps
catching the Nashville goalie off guard since he reacted late.
And
then on their first power play, after Faulk broke up a 3-on-2 with
textbook defending, then drawing a roughing minor on Michael Bunting,
Texier scored his first goal since Feb. 2 to make it 2-0 at 16:57 when the Blues put together
some crisp passing. First it was Dvorsky off the boards quickly to
Zack Bolduc, who found Thomas, and Thomas wired a puck to the back
post for Texier to tap in on the backhand.
“I
just picked up the puck off the boards and I saw ‘Boldy’ open in
the middle so I just gave it to him,” Dvorsky said after playing
10:40 in his debut. “He made a great pass to Robby and then he made
a great pass to ‘Tex’ and he scored. Good play, we scored on the
power (play).”
*
Faulk goal clutch – For much of the second period, the Blues
scuffled.
The
Predators found life after the Forsberg goal and hemmed the Blues in
their zone for large swaths of the second and not allowing them to
get into a transition game and outshot them 8-3 in the second and
were continuing to press in the third.
Until
they did.
All
the Blues needed was one moment, one chance at a clean breakout, and
got it when Thomas sprung Neighbours and Faulk, and Neighbours found
Faulk coming into the zone from the right, and the defenseman wired a
wrist shot high to the glove side at 10:30 for a big goal to make it
3-1.
“We
were chasing the game a little bit there, kind of in the second and
then in the third,” Faulk said. “We didn’t have a ton of
offensive zone time, but it was a good breakout by Thomas there and
Jake just made a good pass actually. I wasn’t even thinking he was
going to do that right away. It was just a good all-around play and
nice to change the momentum and get things going our way and give
ourselves some breathing room I guess.”
Schenn’s
empty-netter with sent the Blues home winners with 38 seconds to
play.
“We
believed in ourselves the whole way,” Thomas said of the six-game
winning streak. “We thought we were playing pretty good hockey for
a good chunk of the year and weren’t getting the results. We stuck
with it and now we’re getting those results. Been really impressed,
especially with our third periods. The last two games, our third
periods have been really good. That’s what teams with confidence,
good teams do to keep on winning.”
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Pat Maroon: I’ve Given Everything I Have, And I Want To Go Out On My Own Terms
ST.
LOUIS – The tears and emotions started running early for Pat Maroon, and only
the ‘Hometown Hero’ knew why before anyone else.
The
36-year-old and Oakville, Mo. native was set to play against the St.
Louis Blues for the final time this season with the hated Chicago
Blackhawks. The Blues are in a playoff race, and the Blackhawks are
just playing out the string.
But
was it just the final game against the Blues this season? Well, take
a look. It was more than that.
Maroon
spoke to former Blues and current Blackhawks color analyst Darren
Pang during pregame of the Blues’ 4-1 win at Enterprise Center on
Saturday and confirmed that this, his 14th
NHL season, will be his last.
More
than 840 regular-season games (125 goals, 195 assists), 163 playoff games (23 goals, 30 assists), a three-time – and three straight –
Stanley Cup champion, including the first with the Blues in 2018-19,
a career that began with the St. Louis Amateur Blues U18 midget squad
in 2004-05 and playing for Jon Cooper with the St. Louis Bandits of
the North American Hockey League in 2006-07 before being a
sixth-round pick by the Philadelphia Flyers in the 2007 NHL Draft,
Maroon, who signed a one-year, $1.3 million contract with the
Blackhawks last summer, said this is it.
His career began with the Anaheim Ducks with stops with the Edmonton Oilers, New Jersey Devils, Blues, Tampa Bay Lightning, Minnesota Wild, Boston Bruins and Blackhawks.
“It’s
been in the back of my head all year,” said Maroon, who ended the game in style with his 96th career fight in the third period with Blues defenseman Tyler Tucker.
“I’ve given everything I have, and I want to go out on my own
terms. I don’t want to be scratching and clawing for a contract,
and them telling you you’re out. I wanted to leave on my own terms
and when I was ready. I’m excited for my new chapter in life. Just
going to finish hard. You guys know I play between the whistles and
as hard as I can. Every time I get over the boards, it’s like my
last shift ever. I’m going to continue to do that.
“My
wife [Francesca]
doesn’t
want me to hang them up. She wants me to keep playing. It’s just
the choice I had. I have no regrets in this game. I’ve given it
everything. I’ve done everything. I achieved everything I could.
St. Louis kid, growing up here, I was 352 games in the minors, and
840 games in the NHL right now. Who would’ve thought that? I’m
just happy I got to win in my hometown, and go on to win two more.
I’ve achieved everything I thought (I could). I probably
overachieved sometimes. I was against all odds, and I beat the odds.
I was always a person, I was self-motivated. I wanted to do it all on
my own because (everyone) had doubt in me. Everyone doubted me, and I
wanted to put that doubt in everyone else’s face.”
Word
spread quickly that Maroon made his announcement on the Blackhawks
broadcast. The Blues went into immediate production and threw
together a video tribute showing the famous double-overtime goal
against the Dallas Stars in the second round and a standing and loud
ovation from a crowd appreciative of one of their own who helped
bring the title to the Gateway City for the first time.
“I
was shocked what the Blues did for me tonight,” Maroon said. “They
didn’t have to do that. Obviously, I’ve been talking about it
with my wife and my family. I’ve done everything I could in this
league. I have no regrets. Just having a conversation with ‘Panger’,
it kind of blew up. First, I wanted to thank the St. Louis Blues
organization for really making this night really special for me and
my family.
“Thank
God they told me before the period started, so I was ready for it.
The Blues didn’t have to do anything tonight. I was just playing a
hockey game. Obviously, people got wind of it right away after I
talked to ‘Panger’, and they really made it a special night for
me. I can’t thank the Blues organization for doing that for me and
my family tonight. Everyone was here tonight, so that made it really
special.”
In
front of his wife, parents and other family members on
hand, Maroon took a stroll onto the ice, acknowledged the crowd and
then again at game’s end when he was announced as the First Star of
the game, taking a look around to soak it all in.
“A
lot,” he said. “I looked a lot, especially during the national
anthem and especially on the bench, TV timeouts. This city means a
lot to me. The fanbase means a lot. The organization means a lot to
me. Some of those guys that I won with mean a lot to me. I can’t
thank them enough for helping me make tonight successful.”
That
included Blues captain Brayden Schenn, a teammate and forever friend.
“He’s
an incredible human, an incredible guy,” Schenn said. “A guy that
really came in here and really helped embrace the locker room and
become a huge piece on and off the ice of what this team is all
about. Rightfully so, the crowd did him right, a guy that’s just
grinded for everything that he’s got in his whole career. He’s a
guy that plays hard minutes, he’s fought tough guys throughout his
whole career playing at 36, 37 doing it the way he does. It’s
definitely hat’s off to him.
“I
don’t love seeing him in that jersey, I’m not going to lie, but
being his last game here in St. Louis, obviously very emotional,
talked to him after. When you win with guys, you care about guys
quite a bit. Nice to see him and get a good salute tonight by the
crowd and nice tribute by the Blues PR team.”
Maroon
broke the heart of Blues coach Jim Montgomery, who was the coach of
the Stars on that Game 7 on May 7, 2019 day in St. Louis but also had
Maroon last season as coach of the Boston Bruins.
“I
had the good fortune of coaching Pat Maroon in Boston last year and
in the playoffs,” he said. “He is an exemplary and great teammate
and he’s an incredibly intelligent hockey mind and player. He’s
very underrated about how well he understands the game. He’s one of
the best players at making plays off walls and breakouts at leading
to 2-on-1s, and everybody knows how he sacrifices for the team. And
on the bench, he made a huge impact for us in Boston because he
brings energy, he lifts people up, he coaches people that he’s
playing with. Sorry to see him retire, but what a career. A
champion.”
That
champion almost never materialized in St. Louis when the Blues nearly
placed Maroon on waivers in what was amounting to an underachieving
season that obviously quickly turned around, and Maroon became one of
those galvanizing voices in a locker room that came together at the
right time and stood above all else in June.
“I
think he just does it with kind of understanding people,
understanding the ebbs and flows of a season, and a guy that really
knows has the way with words helping people along the way,” Schenn
said of Maroon. “That team was just so tight, he’s just obviously
another piece to everyone that being so close and he was definitely a
ring leader with lots of laughs when you combine him with [Ryan]
O’Reilly and [Tyler] Bozak, [Jaden] Schwartz, [Robert] Bortuzzo,
the list goes on and on, right? A special person and obviously a
friend for life.
“Without
that (Game 7 goal), just a legendary goal, legendary celebration by
the hometown kid. It’s obviously one of those memories you look
back on, as that team, as life goes on, you have a lot of beers over,
talk about memories and stuff like that with how everything went.”
Maroon’s
playoff career is over. Depending on how many of the Blackhawks’
final 12 games he plays, will be it. So that last lap around
Enterprise Center was one to store in the memory bank.
“It
sucks. When I’m done here, I’m going to be a Blues fan,” Maroon
said.
“I’ll be coming to games, just like all the other alumni. It’s
going to be fun coming back here and watching the Blues play. St.
Louis kid get the opportunity to end on a high note, get the
opportunity to actually play in St. Louis to end the year. It’s
pretty remarkable. I couldn’t write a better script on how all this
transpired today. I’m really happy, like I said, with the St. Louis
Blues. I’m happy where I’m at. I’m content. Whatever happens in
the next chapter, I’m just going to have to go do it again.”
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 4-1 Win Against Blackhawks
ST.
LOUIS – You
kind of had a sense this was in store for the St. Louis Blues on
Saturday.
After
an emotional 4-3 overtime win against the Vancouver Canucks on
Thursday to move into the second wild card into the Western
Conference, recovering and playing another game less than 48 hours
later, against the Chicago Blackhawks no less, was going to be a
tough motivational game to get up for. Even though these points mean
just as much as any.
The
Blues had been playing so much clean hockey since the 4 Nations
Face-Off, but it was predictable that they would have a bit of a
clunker, and it was in danger there for a bit, as the young
Blackhawks, playing for jobs for next year, were pushing them to the
brink.
But
the energy guys of Alexey Toropchenko and Nathan Walker led the
charge each with a goal and assist, Robert Thomas and Zack Bolduc
each scored, combined with another stellar outing by Joel Hofer (26
saves), and the Blues won their season-high fifth straight, 4-1
against the Blackhawks at Enterprise Center on Saturday.
“There’s
probably a couple factors. The emotion of Thursday night. It was a
roller-coaster game and obviously it meant a lot, and I just think
you’re going to have … when you watch the league, there’s some
nights, for whatever reason, a team has no legs,” Blues coach Jim
Montgomery said. ‘The great thing for us was, I don’t think we
were even close to our ‘A’ game and yet we managed the game. We
weren’t perfect, but we grinded it out. We were incredibly selfless
and we ended up pulling out a win. Chicago was playing well. They
were checking well.”
The
Blues (36-28-7), who lead the wild card by two points on the Calgary
Flames, who have two games in hand, and the Vancouver Canucks by
three points and Utah Hockey Club by four, who host the Nashville
Predators on Sunday, played without forward Pavel Buchnevich, ruled
out due to what the team called illness, was not in sync and it
showed but found a way in the end to persevere.
“They
played hard, they defended hard, they forechecked hard, they came at
us,” Blues captain Brayden Schenn said of the Blackhawks. “I
don’t think we were at our best today, but give them credit, they
checked well.”
The
Blues swept the three-game season series, the second time in their
history doing so (4-0-0 in 2019-20).
Let’s
get into Saturday’s Three Takeaways:
*
Fourth line willed Blues – Montgomery preaches habits and details.
Toropchenko, Walker and Radek Faksa are usually at the front of the
line when it comes to them.
For
large swaths of the game, the Blues were sloppy with the puck, there
wasn’t the typical forecheck, but when those practice habits were
on par, enter the fourth line.
“They
lead us with our habits,” Montgomery said. ‘We’ve been
preaching habits for a long time now. We’re seeing that.
“We
weren’t very clean the first two periods, but that line was. Every
time they got on the ice, we either got a face-off in their end or
they changed in the offensive end. It’s nice to see them get
rewarded, and they really made some high-end plays.”
It
took a Thomas midair tip goal to get the scoring started at 15:13 of
the second period, but Toropchenko made it 2-0 at 17:20 when all
three forwards touched the puck after a quick up by Cam Fowler.
“We
were just on top of them and grinding, grinding, grinding. They made
that play, Fowler got the puck, he passed it to ‘Walks,’ ‘Walks’
chip it to Faksa and Faksa found me with a great pass.
“Main
focus on our line is have good habits every game. It doesn’t matter
when. Even on the practice day, make yourself better and just push
through and play hard.
“I
think we just all play the same way, all play like hard hockey, just
grind, be physical, be good on the forecheck and first of all, be
great in the ‘D’ zone and wear the other team down and make some
good stuff for our teammates.”
It
happened again on Walker’s goal at 1:12 of the third period that
made it 3-1 after Chicago scored shorthanded with 54 seconds left in
the second period.
It
was a momentum-swinging goal that made it 2-1, but the fourth line
drew it back for the home side by making a good, smart play off the
edge and to the net with Toropchenko finding Walker.
“The
game on Thursday and it’s sometimes hard to come back and back that
up,” Walker said. “The first period really wasn’t up to our
standards. I think if we can kind of do the little things and chip in
here and there, I think we can go a long way with it.”
“Yeah,
it led us,” Montgomery said. “They scored two key goals that
separated us. That was good.”
Bolduc, who got rewarded by being promoted to the top line in Buchnevich's absense, got in on the fun to close out the scoring at 7:43 of the third on a net front rebound to make it 4-1.
*
Hofer kept Blues in it – When the play looks sketchy in front of
the goalie, sometimes the goalie’s play needs to be strong.
Hofer
made a number of bail-out saves in this game when it was 0-0.
The
Blues weren’t doing him any favors with turnovers and getting
checked off pucks, but Hofer, who is 4-0-1 his past five starts, was
clean with most of his handles, he was seeing pucks through traffic
and most importantly, didn’t allow Chicago to gain momentum and
confidence by scoring first, which the Blackhawks had a number of
opportunities to do so.
*
The ‘Hometown Hero’ goes out in style in last game in St. Louis –
In an interview with former Blues color commentator and current
Blackhawks color analyst Darren Pang pregame, Oakville native Pat
Maroon announced this season, his 14th
season, will be his last in the NHL.
Maroon,
who played 10:41 and got into his 96th
career fight in the third period with Blues defenseman Tyler Tucker,
received accolades from Blues fans thanks to the team’s Bluenote
Productions staff with a video tribute and the game’s First Star
and ensuing interview on FDSNMW with Jamie Rivers.
Needless
to say, Maroon, who was a key component on the Blues’ first-ever
Stanley Cup championship squad in 2018-19, scoring one of the most
important goals in franchise history in the second round of Game 7 in
double overtime, winning the game 2-1 and sending the Blues into the
Western Conference Final against the San Jose Sharks, was emotional
during and after the game.
“I
was shocked what the Blues did for me tonight,” Maroon
said.
“They didn’t have to do that. Obviously, I’ve been talking
about it with my wife and my family. I’ve done everything I could
in this league. I have no regrets. Just having a conversation with
‘Panger,’ it kind of blew up. First, I wanted to thank the St.
Louis Blues organization for really making this night really special
for me and my family.
“Thank
God they told me before the period started, so I was ready for (the
tribute).
The Blues didn’t have to do anything tonight. I was just playing a
hockey game. Obviously, people got wind of it right away after I
talked to ‘Panger’, and they really made it a special night for
me. I can’t thank the Blues organization for doing that for me and
my family tonight. Everyone was here tonight, so that made it really
special.”
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Blues Recall 2023 First-Round Pick, Will Make NHL Debut Sunday
ST. LOUIS -- The Dalibor Dvorsky era is off and running.
The St. Louis Blues recalled the No. 10 pick in the 2023 NHL Draft from Springfield of the American Hockey league on Saturday night, and the center will make his debut against the Nashville Predators.
"Do what got you here, play to your strengths," Blues coach Jim Montgomery on his message to Dvorsky. "I think not only in your first game, but a lot of times you've got to talk to players about what you can do."
Dvorsky, 19, will skate with Mathieu Joseph and Alexandre Texier on a line.
"We're excited to watch him play tonight, as I'm sure all of our fan base is," Montgomery said. "I've never seen him skate, and I've never been on the ice with him. If he's playing well, he's going to play a lot. That's the way I go into every game with every player."
The Dvorsky recall is in correlation to Pavel Buchnevich, who missed a 4-1 win against the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday with an illness. Montgomery said after the game and on Sunday that Buchnevich is day to day.
"'Buch' is good," Montgomery said. "It's just a day to day thing. He's not himself right now feeling healthy. We all get viral infections and stuff."
Dvorsky has 43 points (20 goals, 23 assists) in 57 games with the Thunderbirds.
His goals are tied for third among AHL rookies and fifth in points.
Dvorsky was not in the lineup for the Thunderbirds on Saturday and had a four-game point streak (two goals, two assists).
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(3-22-25) Blackhawks-Blues Gameday Lineup
ST. LOUIS -- For the St. Louis Blues, now comes the hard part.
It's one thing to be the hunter trying to chase down those in front of them for the Western Conference wild card, but now to be the hunted, which the Blues (35-28-7), who host the Chicago Blackhawks (20-40-9) on Saturday at 2 p.m. (FDSNMW, ESPN 101.1-FM), are, being chased by three teams (Vancouver Canucks, Calgary Flames, Utah Hockey Club) makes the final 12 games that much more interesting.
But what it does is not change a thing.
"That's a pretty myopic vision right now," Blues coach Jim Montgomery said after a very brief practice Friday. "We have the Blackhawks at (2 p.m.) tomorrow. We're going to get ready for them.
"It's going to come down to the last game because there's just not enough games left and not enough point separation to be able to take a breath, and that's great. What we've been doing, it's what we're used to. Our mindset's in the moment. I sound like a broken record, but that's what we have been focused on."
That's the message relayed to the players, and they have had it ingrained in them since making this 11-2-2 run.
"Yeah 100 percent, that's the message," said forward Dylan Holloway, who scored in the third period to give the Blues a 3-2 lead. "We can't get too high or too low. It was a big win tonight, but we've got more games coming. It's tight. ... It's as tight as it's ever been, and we've just got to keep going."
But boy, that will be a task after such an emotional 4-3 overtime win on Thursday at home against the Canucks when Philip Broberg scored at 3:42 of overtime to put the Blues one point ahead of Vancouver, two ahead of Calgary and four ahead of Utah. The Canucks have a game in hand while the Flames have two games in hand.
"They have a tough schedule coming at some point, where they're not going to be able to take a breath," Montgomery said. "Coming up, we're going to have a couple of two days off in between games. That's going to be really beneficial, but until we get there, we've just got to push through and we've done that. Our mental toughness, the way we prepare, the way guys are going out shift after shift playing really good hockey has been very impressive."
Nonetheless, there was so much to like for Montgomery in a game that had so many range of emotions, both good and bad.
"I just the think the way we played," he said. "We were committed to playing the right way. Vancouver pushed in the second, and then we pushed back in the last eight and a half minutes of the second. The third period, I think it was a combination of nerves and it's not an excuse, but the density of the schedule we made some decisions that I don't think are common for us lately, more common in January. It's just an opportunity for us to reset, recharge the batteries and get ready for another two big games here."
The Blues had their team photo day at Enterprise Center on Friday and skated for a shade under 15 minutes.
Oskar Sundqvist was the lone absentee from the skate due to a maintenance day, but Montgomery said the forward would be available to play on Saturday.
The Blues will be going for their second-ever season series sweep of the Blackhawks; they own a 6-2 win at the 2025 NHL Discover Winter Classic at Wrigley Field in Chicago on Dec. 31 and a wild 6-5 shootout win at Enterprise Center on Feb. 8.
The Blues' only season sweep was in 2919-20 when they went 4-0-0.
- - -
Blues Projected Lineup:
Jake Neighbours-Robert Thomas-Zack Bolduc
Dylan Holloway-Brayden Schenn-Jordan Kyrou
Alexandre Texier-Oskar Sundqvist-Mathieu Joseph
Alexey Toropchenko-Radek Faksa-Nathan Walker
Cam Fowler-Nick Leddy
Philip Broberg-Justin Faulk
Ryan Suter-Tyler Tucker
Joel Hofer is projected to start in goal; Jordan Binnington would be the backup.
Healthy scratches include Alexandre Texier and Matthew Kessel. Colton Parayko (knee) remains out. Pavel Buchnevich (illness) is out. Torey Krug (ankle) is out for the season.
- - -
Blackhawks Projected Lineup:
Ilya Mikheyev-Frank Nazar-Connor Bedard
Teuvo Teravainen-Jason Dickinson-Nick Foligno
Joe Veleno-Ryan Donato-Tyler Bertuzzi
Landon Slaggert-Lukas Reichel-Patrick Maroon
Alex Vlasic-Wyatt Kaiser
Ethan Del Mastro-Connor Murphy
Alec Martinez-Artyom Levshunov
Arvid Soderblom will start in goal; Spencer Knight will be the backup.
Healthy scratches include Philipp Kurashev, TJ Brodie and Louis Crevier. Laurent Brossoit (knee) and Colton Dach (elbow) are out.
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 4-3 OT Win Against Canucks
ST.
LOUIS – Who thought this was possible a month ago?
We
don’t know how things will shake out in the end, as things can
change from day to day, but in a span of 26 days, the St. Louis Blues
went from being eight points out of a playoff position to holding
down the final wild card in the Western Conference.
It
didn’t go according to play, but a playoff-like atmosphere
developed between the Blues and Vancouver Canucks, and when Philip
Broberg scored at 3:42 of overtime to send the Blues to their fourth
straight win, 4-3, over the Canucks at Enterprise Center on Thursday,
it moved the Blues (35-28-7) above the playoff line in the Western
Conference for the first time since Nov. 6 by matching their season-high fourth straight win.
“That
was a playoff game and boy, what momentum swings in it,” Blues
coach Jim Montgomery said. “I really liked our resilience.”
“Yeah,
that was an incredible atmosphere,” said Blues forward Dylan
Holloway. “Our fans were super loud. You could feed off that
energy. After ‘Tucksy’ scored, they were jumping. It was really
fun to be a part of. I thought our crowd was awesome tonight.”
Tyler
Tucker, aka ‘Tucksy,’ also had a goal and an assist and Zack
Bolduc scored, while Jordan Binnington, while not tested often, made
15 saves.
“I
think it’s the same thing, you’ve got to keep sticking to what’s
made us successful here lately,” Broberg said. “We’ve just got
to keep that going here the last games.”
It
was a crazy up-and-down, emotional game with plenty of playoff
implications, and the emotional roller coaster was none more evident
than the third period after it was a nip-and-tuck 1-0 game through 40
minutes.
Then
things didn’t necessarily open up, but guys …
“Made
really good plays, made really good shots,” Montgomery said. “And
there’s more desperation offensively, so you saw that from both
teams.”
Let’s
get into the Three Takeaways:
*
Blues are showing incredible resiliency – You want to talk about a
range of emotions, then this was the game for you.
The
Blues started this game well but were kept off the scoreboard by
Canucks goalie Kevin Lankinen.
When
Vancouver pushed in the second, the Blues had to absorb the
counter-punches.
And
when Bolduc made it 1-0 at 15:47 of the second period finally
breaking through, one wondered with so much at stake whether it would
be difficult to get scoring chances in the third period.
Well
…
The
Canucks came out and sent a strong message to start the third that
they weren’t going to relinquish the second wild card that easily.
When
Kiefer Sherwood tied it 1-1 at 1:11 of the third and then Brock
Boeser scored the first of two goals, including his 200th
in the NHL, that gave Vancouver a lead at 6:35, now it was the
Canucks’ turn to try and lock down a tight one-goal lead.
Maybe
earlier in the season, the Blues would have wilted.
Not
these Blues, not this day.
“The
talk on the bench was great,” Montgomery said. “It was just,
‘Let’s just go get it back, plenty of time. Let’s get back to
the goal line, let’s get back to playing in the offensive zone.’
The talk on the bench was very positive. It was never, ‘What did we
just give up?’ We’re staying in the moment really well mentally.”
Tucker
and Holloway would restore the lead in short order. They scored 24
seconds apart and the Blues regained the lead 3-2, with Tucker
scoring at 9:28 off a face-off win by Brayden Schenn, and Holloway
finishing off a Jordan Kyrou pass at 9:52 to make it 3-2.
“Yeah
obviously a huge goal,” Tucker
said. “Just
tried to get it through. Obviously a big win by ‘Schenner’ there.
It was fortunate enough to go in.”
Tucker
then blocked a Sherwood shot that began the sequence for the go-ahead
goal.
“As
soon as I touched the puck, ‘Rouzy’ was yelling for it, so I knew
that he had some speed,” Holloway
said.
“He usually gets excited like that when he's buzzing up the ice. So
as soon as I passed it to him, I tried to get on my horse and go back
post. He made a helluva pass over and all I had to do was tap in.
“That's
where we've grown so much as a team, not getting too high, not
getting too low. We knew it was going to be a tight-checking game.
That's another team trying to get into the playoffs just like us. We
knew it was going to be hard. Down by a goal, we still had that
belief. Even when it went into OT, we still believed that we were
going to win. I think that's probably the biggest thing that we've
grown on so far.”
And
when Boeser scored the tying goal at 19:56 to tie the game 3-3, it
was a gut punch that could have provided devastating affects.
Again,
a mental fortitude was tested and one was passed when Broberg
finished Schenn’s pass off a 2-on-1 – that Holloway sprung –
and ended the game and put the Blues into the wild card when he went
backhand for the finish at 3:42 of overtime.
“I
just tried to drive the net and he was able to do a great pass and I
just tried to take it to the backhand and just happy it went in.
“It
speaks a lot to the belief in this group. Nobody stopped working. We
came back and I thought we played a very good game today.”
*
Tucker/young players are growing into quite the prospects -- Here we have a pressure-packed game with
tremendous playoff implications, and there is Tucker, Jake
Neighbours, Holloway, Broberg, Bolduc all in the middle of it.
Tucker
came up with clutch plays with the game on the line, played 15:49
with five hits and five blocked shots and none bigger than the one
that led to the Holloway goal.
These
are valuable lessons that the young Blues are gaining, not only in
the immediate but for the future.
“It’s
a lot of guys, right? Jake Neighbours hasn’t been in this kind of
stretch run, Bolduc and then you have Tucker, right,” Montgomery
said. “We’re starting to see these guys. The experience they’re
getting down the stretch run is only going to help us next year and
for years to come, and that’s why we’re very thankful our team
has been able to play so well to get into these types of games like
this. This is not only going to help us this year but years to come.
“I’ll
say this for Tucker. He’s really a good offensive defenseman, and
as he matures in this league, you’re going to see plays like that
more and more. He really understands … his hockey brain is really
good. It’s underestimated by a lot of people and I think people
will see that over the next couple of years of how good of a Blue
he’s going to be for us.”
Broberg
added, “I
think [Tucker’s] playing great. He’s made a huge impact and he’s
an unbelievable guy too. I’m happy for him.”
I’ll
admit I had Tucker written off a long time ago. When he was cut from
training camp and assigned to Springfield after clearing waivers, the
Blues had seven guys (including Scott Perunovich and Pierre-Olivier
Joseph) in front of Tucker, who was eighth on the depth chart, and
with the acquisition of Fowler, he was essentially in a no-win
situation until he wasn’t.
It’s
tremendous perseverance from a seventh-round pick with one last
chance who’s made himself a reliable, dependable NHL defenseman in
the end who keeps growing.
*
Game-tying goal late could be costly point to give away? -- We’ll
know more when all is said and done, but should the Blues miss the
playoffs by a point – like the 2017-18 season – they’ll look
back at the sequence of events that led to giving up a costly point
in this game.
It
all started when Justin Faulk, with time and space along the wall,
instead of just playing the puck into open ice in the neutral zone or
into the Vancouver zone, made a critical mistake and played it into
the Canucks bench from his own zone and brought the face-off back
into the Blues zone with 17.5 seconds left.
And
even after winning the face-off, Faulk was killed off along the wall
by Jake DeBrusk and another puck wasn’t cleared right away, but the
puck did get moved out into the neutral zone, but the Blues allowed
the great Quinn Hughes to shift around Pavel Buchnevich, find Elias
Pettersson at the offensive zone blue line, and veteran Ryan Suter
had vacated the opposite side to move to his right and help the play
in the middle left Boeser alone and he stepped into a slap shot from
the right circle to beat Binnington and tie the game 3-3.
It
could have been a momentum-zapper – it left 18.096 stunned – but
ultimately, it wasn’t. However, it was a point given away, which
could go a long way in the end.
“I
thought we should have scored into the empty net twice [Alexey
Toropchenko and Buchnevich], so you’ve got to end the game there.
We should have executed better. We won the face-off, that puck’s
got to get out and then the last thing is on that line rush, we’ve
got to have sticks protecting middle ice and they were able to go
east-west on us five feet inside the blue line. That shouldn’t
happen to us.”
It
shouldn’t, but they were able to conquer the gut punch.
“It's
definitely deflating, but that's where we've grown as a team,”
Holloway
said.
“I think early on in the year we probably get down on ourselves,
but as soon as that happened, we weren't very happy, but the message
on the bench was just stay with it, we've got this, we're going to
win. We had that team belief. When guys are stepping up and saying
that, it kind of chills the bench a little bit, kind of cools us off
a little bit. We were lucky enough to win that in OT. ‘Schenner’
and ‘Broby’ made a helluva play.”
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(3-20-25) Canucks-Blues Gameday Lineup
ST.
LOUIS – It’s not exactly make-or-break time for the St. Louis
Blues and Vancouver Canucks, but to call Thursday’s game between
the two at Enterprise Center (Disney+, HULU, ESPN+, ESPN 101.1-FM)
just another regular season game would be a gross understatement.
The
Blues (34-28-7) and Canucks (32-25-11) are even in points (75) in the
second wild card in the Western Conference, and a regulation win for
either side would be a huge advantage, especially for the Canucks,
who do have a game in hand and currently hold the position because of
that scenario.
So
the Blues, who have 13 games remaining, know the implications.
“It’s
massive, it’s huge,” said Blues forward Dylan Holloway, who is
riding a four-game point streak (two goals, five assists). “The
standings are so tight. We’ve got (a game) played more than they
do, so Thursday’s game is huge.”
Jordan
Kyrou, who has five goals and three assists in a three-game point
streak, said, “It’s a huge game for us. Vancouver is right there
with us in the standings. We need to be ready to go tonight.”
Indeed.
The
Blues have the most points (20) since the 4 Nations Face-Off break
resumed and are 10-2-2 the past 14 games, including a 4-1 win against the Nashville Predators on Tuesday, to erase an eight-point
deficit and climb their way back into this.
Their
confidence level is as high as it’s been all season, and these are
the kinds of games they’ll be measured up to when all is said and
done.
“I
think guys are excited,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said. “It’s
the biggest game of the year because of the time of the year, but
we’ve put ourselves in the situation where we’re in sights of
Vancouver. They have a little bit of an advantage on us with the game
in hand, but it’s a four-point game. Everyone’s excited for puck
drop.
“You
worry about your identity. You worry about playing to our game. We’ve
played a lot of good teams here in the last little while and our
commitment to playing the right way without the puck, and especially
with the puck has allowed us to defend really well.”
The
Canucks have won three of four and outscored their opponents 17-10,
and the Blues are 1-1-0 against them in the season series, winning
4-3 in overtime on Dec. 10 and losing 5-2 here on home ice Jan. 27.
“You’ve
got to be ready to grind out a low-scoring win,” Montgomery said.
“They defend really well, they don’t give up a lot of odd-man
rushes. They really protect the most valuable part of the ice, the
middle of the ice really well in all three zones, their forecheck is
really good. We’ve got to be clean, we’ve got to making sure
we’re coming back hard so that we can get out of our zone, so we
don’t spend a lot of time there tonight.”
Of
course the Blues will have to be wary of Vancouver captain Quinn
Hughes at all times. The defenseman leads the team in assists (49),
points (65) and is a plus-11.
“You
have to be aware of him in all three zones,” Montgomery said. “He’s
so slippery, his puck deception, if it’s not the best in the
league, it’s among the elite players in the league. Not only the
puck deception of where he passes it but where he goes after he
passes it. People will say you’ve got to just worry about him in
the offensive zone, but in the neutral zone, he’s so dynamic and on
breakouts, he’s not a guy you say, ‘Oh, just go hit him because
he’s not the biggest defenseman.’ It’s not easy to do. He knows
where everybody is and it’s almost like he’s playing chess while
a lot of other people are playing checkers.”
-
- -
Blues
Projected
Lineup:
Jake Neighbours-Robert Thomas-Pavel
Buchnevich
Dylan Holloway-Brayden Schenn-Jordan
Kyrou
Mathieu Joseph-Oskar Sundqvist-Zack
Bolduc
Alexey Toropchenko-Radek Faksa-Nathan
Walker
Cam Fowler-Nick Leddy
Philip Broberg-Justin Faulk
Ryan Suter-Tyler Tucker
Jordan Binnington will
start in goal; Joel Hofer will
be the backup.
Healthy
scratches
include Alexandre
Texier and
Matthew
Kessel. Colton
Parayko (knee) is
out. Torey Krug (ankle) is out for the season.
-
- -
Canucks
Projected
Lineup:
Nils Hoglander-Elias Pettersson-Brock
Boeser
Jake DeBrusk-Pius Suter-Kiefer
Sherwood
Drew O'Connor-Teddy Blueger-Linus
Karlsson
Dakota Joshua-Nils Aman-Conor
Garland
Quinn Hughes-Tyler Myers
Marcus Pettersson-Filip Hronek
Derek Forbort-Elias Nils Pettersson
Kevin Lankinen will
start in goal;
Arturs Silovs will be the backup.
Healthy
scratches include Victor
Mancini and
Johnathan Lekkermaki. Filip
Chytil (upper body), Thatcher Demko (lower body) and
Noah
Juulsen (lower body).
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Blues Top Prospect Named Hobey Baker Award Finalist
ST. LOUIS -- St. Louis Blues prospect Jimmy Snuggerud, the 23rd pick in the 2022 NHL Draft, was named a top 10 finalist for the 2025 Hobey Baker Memorial Award, given to the top NCAA men's ice hockey player in the nation.
The winner will be announced April 11 live on NHL Network as part of NCAA Frozen Four festivities.
Snuggerud has already cemented his place in Golden Gophers' history as the sixth player to earn three postseason conference awards and now is a finalist for the highest honor in college hockey for the first time in his career.
This season, the junior captain earned All-Big Ten Conference First-Team honors for the second-straight season following second-team recognition as a freshman. He currently leads the Gophers offense with 49 points (22 goals, 27 assists), ranking second in the Big Ten and fifth nationally and is just one shy of his career-high freshman total of 50.
A native of Chaska, Minn., Snuggerud's 22 goals are a career high, with a conference-leading 19 coming in league play during the 2024-25 season.
Snuggerud has recorded points in 29 of 39 games, including 16 multi-point performances, earning three Big Ten First Star of the Week honors this season.
Over his career, he has collected seven Big Ten weekly honors, including a record six First Star selections.
Snuggerud put together a dominant month, his best this season, in January, where he scored 11 goals and assisted on six others, and seven multi-point games, which landed him HCA National Player of the Month recognition. He registered a six-game goal streak in January to set a new career high. He also joined elite company as only the third player in program history to score 20 or more goals in three consecutive seasons, a feat last accomplished over 70 years ago by Hall of Famers John Mayasich and Dick Dougherty.
Four players representing Minnesota have won the Hobey Baker in program history, including Neal Broten (1981), Robb Stauber (1988), Brian Bonin (1996), and Jordan Leopold (2002).
Broten was the first-ever recipient of the award when he scored 71 points (17 goals, 54 assists) in 36 games as a sophomore during the 1980-81 campaign. Most recently, Logan Cooley and Matthew Knies were selected as Hobey Hat Trick Finalists in 2022-23 after Ben Meyers and Jack LaFontaine were top 10 finalists in 2021-22 and 2020-21, respectively.
Snuggerud and Minnesota (25-10-4) are awaiting where and what regional they will play in with hopes of landing at Enterprise Center in St. Louis for the Frozen Four on April 10-12 with the Blues planning on him turn pro after the end of the forward's junior season.
Defenseman Scott Perunovich (2020) was the last Blues prospect to win the prestigious award.
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 4-1 Win Against Predators
NASHVILLE,
Tenn. -- The
beat goes on for the St. Louis Blues, and it’s hard to imagine this
team finding the different types of ways to win. A team usually finds
ways to lose, but not this squad.
Blues
coach Jim Montgomery said the Blues “didn’t feel like our players
had their regular juice,” so when you don’t have the jump needed,
they find different ways to win.
The
Blues continue to defy the odds playing without their defenseman in
Colton Parayko, putting in another defensive masterclass in a 4-1 win
over the Nashville Predators at Bridgestone Arena on Tuesday.
Joel
Hofer continues to play well since he was pulled against the Dallas
Stars on March 2 with 22 saves, and the Blues defensive corps once
again limited an offense filled with potent players to little to
nothing.
“That
was a real gutsy effort,” Montgomery said. “It didn’t feel like
our players had their regular juice. You just could tell by how short
the shifts were, but they dug in and made hard plays in hard areas.
Our penalty kill was excellent, our goaltender was excellent, our
D-corps was fantastic. They just kept killing plays and making poised
plays to get us out of our end repeatedly.”
Jordan
Kyrou scored twice to give him eight points (five goals, three
assists) in a three-game point streak; Justin Faulk had a goal and an
assist to continue to produce with a goal and five assists in a
four-game point streak; Jake Neighbours had a goal, assist and a
fight protecting Pavel Buchnevich (more on that below) to earn
himself a Gordie Howe hat trick; Neighbours has a three-game goal
streak and point streak (with four assists) and Dylan Holloway had
three helpers to give him seven points (two goals, five assists) in a
four-game point streak.
The
offense and production is coming in different shapes, forms and
sizes, and the Blues (34-28-7) are now 10-2-2 in their past 14 games.
“Our
team is playing really well right now,” Holloway said. “I think
it’s everybody, like all four lines. Our D-men are breaking pucks
out nicely and obviously we’re getting some stellar goaltending
too. It’s been awesome playing this way and it’s been fun too.
“All
the games are different. We’ve had to overcome some adversity here
and there. Our team’s responded very well. I think our game’s
trending upwards right now. We’re playing really well and we know
what’s at stake too. Everybody’s playing for each other and it’s
fun hockey right now.”
Here
are Tuesday’s Three Takeaways:
*
Defensemen
killed a ton of plays – We know how much Parayko kills plays when
he’s on the ice playing upwards of 24 minutes a night.
But
with him out, it’s a collective effort. It’s Faulk, it’s Nick
Leddy, it’s Cam Fowler, it’s Philip Broberg, it’s Ryan Suter,
it’s Tyler Tucker, it’s Matthew Kessel (when in the lineup).
This
group held a future hall of famer [Steven Stamkos] to no shot
attempts in the game, limited the opportunities of Jonathan
Marchessault, Ryan O’Reilly and Philip Forsberg to seven shots on
goal. These are Nashville’s top end players and they were reduced
to little to nothing on Tuesday.
“It
was really impressive,” Montgomery said. “I thought our D-corps
carried us that way. Their gaps were excellent and then when they had
any kind of sustained pressure, we killed plays and we used our
support in the middle of the ice, which allowed us to get speed on
entries at their blue line.”
*
Scoring in different ways – The Blues found multiple ways to score
– again.
It’s
not one player either, it’s many of them, but the top end guys are
finding the scoresheet.
“I
think our top two lines are scoring a lot now, so they’re leading
us that way like you need to to have success like we’re having, and
our other two lines are relishing their roles and playing good hockey
and chipping in offensively as well,” Montgomery said.
Including
Faulk, who got the ball rolling with a power-play goal at 6:04 of the
first period, a one-timer to make it 1-0.
“Since
the 4 Nations, his game is right where when I was here as an
assistant coach, I was used to watching him play every night,”
Montgomery said. “He’s confident, he’s really strong on pucks
at both ends of the ice and he’s just keeping plays alive in the
offensive zone. Defensively, he’s winning 1-on-1, 1-on-2 battles
and moving pucks north for us.”
Neighbours
made it 2-0 at 18:16 when the Blues executed a perfect breakout and
zone entry, then Robert Thomas slipped a puck to Faulk, who found
Neighbours cutting down the ice, he gut it to the backhand past Juuse
Saros and tucked it into an empty cage.
Kyrou’s
first was a slippery shot, at 18:50 of the second period that made it
3-0 on another clean zone entry, and instead of throwing the puck
away, he kept it, moved to the top of the left circle and just
wristed one on net that slipped by Saros on the short side.
And
despite allowing a last-second goal to Brady Skjei with 0.6 seconds
left in the second to make it a 3-1 game, the Blues executed another
perfect play when Holloway jumped a face-off, stole a puck and worked
a 2-on-1 with Kyrou getting his 29th
at 13:45 to put the game out of reach at 4-1.
“Their
right ‘D’ was kind of playing a little low,” Holloway said.
“They were either trying to do a 1-2 play or a play to the corner.
The puck kind of popped out perfectly. Schenner pushed it nice kind
of right in front. It was kind of out of the gate 2-on-1. It’s
always a treat to get those.”
*
Buchnevich’s health scare – Well, the Blues haven’t had a ton of
injuries this season, but when Colton Parayko went down, they’ve
been able to hold down the fort – so far – since he went down on
March 5.
When
Buchnevich took that high hit from Michael McCarron behind the Blues
goal, the Blues forward needed help from trainer Ray Barile and
Robert Thomas off the ice.
We’re
likely talking concussion symptoms of some sort, since
Montgomery said Buchnevich was in the protocol for the rest of the
second period after the infraction occurred at 6:12 of the second
period.
It
could have been a big
blow since that top line with Neighbours, who immediately jumped in
to fight McCarron, and Thomas with Buchnevich had been scorching.
But
he returned to play the third period with no issues.
The
Blues avoided a head injury with Kyrou on Sunday against the Anaheim
Ducks when he was hit by Jacob Trouba. This one, they
got lucky as well.
“He
was real good,” Montgomery said. ‘Obviously passed the protocol
test and in the third period, it was good to have him because him and
Schenn and Neighbours missed a little bit of time, but they were
really fresh because of that. We needed fresh legs in the third.”
As
for sticking up for him, Neighbours said, “Yeah absolutely. Really
close to Buchy. Just really tough to watch that hit. It’s instincts
and that’s the culture we have here. You stand up for one another.”
And as for that Gordie Howe hatty, Neighbours joked that his actual one was nowhere near Brayden Schenn's near-miss on Sunday when he stuck up for Kyrou.
"
No,
my fight wasn’t anything like his fights usually are, so I’m not
going to brag about that one. That’s just a fight on the
scoresheet, but it wasn’t much of one in real life.
*
Bonus takeaway on Hofer’s play – Hofer was pulled against the
Stars after allowing three goals on nine shots on a 6-3 loss.
He’s
followed it up with three starts going 2-0-1 allowing just four goals
in those three starts.
“It’s
great,” Hofer said. “I’ve got to give all the credit to the
guys. We’re playing great hockey. It’s a lot of fun, we’ve got
a lot of swag and we’ve got to keep this going, we’re building
something here. It’s a lot of fun.”
It’s
safe to say he’s had a short memory.
“Yeah,
I think so,” Hofer said. “Obviously sucks in the moment, but you
learn a lot from it. It’s just one game. It doesn’t define who
you are. It’s good to bounce back and get a couple of wins.”
Jordan
Binnington will start against the Canucks, but it’s obvious that
Montgomery won’t hesitate to start his 6-foot-5 tendy.
“It
just shows you the confidence and swagger he has, but also that the
team has,” Montgomery said. “Just the self-belief that he has in
himself. We’re lucky we have two goalies that really believe in
themselves and they give our team confidence every time they’re in
the crease.”
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Blues Prospect Named First-Team All Big Ten Selection
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Jimmy Snuggerud's accomplishments in his junior season at the University of Minnesota didn't go unnoticed.
The forward was named by Big Ten to its first team on Tuesday.
Snuggerud, 20, the No. 23 pick of the 2022 NHL Draft who helped lead the Gophers to a final ranking of No. 5 with a 25-10-4 record, finishing with 49 points (22 goals, 27 assists) in 39 games before the Gophers were upset by Penn State in the quarterfinals of the conference tournament, falling in three games of the best-of-3 series.
Minnesota awaits where it will go in the NCAA Tournament, which runs March 27-30 before the Frozen Four commences at Enterprise Center in St. Louis April 10-12.
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(3-18-25) Blues-Predators Gameday Lineup
NASHVILLE,
Tenn. -- Now that the St. Louis Blues have caught up to their margin
of deficit in the Western Conference wild card race, now is when the
work begins.
It
all starts on Tuesday when the Blues (33-28-7) face the Nashville
Predators (25-33-8) at 7 p.m. at Bridgestone Arena, the first of
three meetings in 10 days between the two clubs.
The
Blues are rolling to say the least, winning nine of their past 13
games (9-2-2) and outscoring their opponents 53-36 (plus-17) in that
stretch. But in playing some of the lower end teams in the league
standings and those below them in the standings has seemed to be a
challenge for the Blues in recent past. They know this is no time to
be taking anyone for granted, especially an opponent that had so much
hope riding on this season and one that has grossly underachieved.
“I’m
not concerned with Nashville’s, I’m concerned with our mindset
and how we’re going to go about beating a very dangerous offensive
team that has an elite goaltender,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery
said. “When you put up that lineup and you see [Ryan] O’Reilly,
you see [Steven] Stamkos, you see [Jonathan] Marchessault, you see
[Filip] Forsberg, there’s a lof of guys that have had 50-, 40-, and
30-goal seasons, and we respect the fact of what they’ve done in
their whole body of work and we know on any given night of what they
can do.
“We’ve
had some good meetings just about keeping up with what’s been
working and what our identity is and focusing on the task at hand.
We’ve got Nashville here, they’re five games over .500 at home.
This is a real good home team and we have to be ready to go.”
The
job was tough enough, especially with the number of games dwindling
and the amount of teams surrounding the playoff chase, but the Blues
have caught the deficit faced (eight points) and are tied with the
Vancouver Canucks for the final wild card and are two points ahead of
each of the Calgary Flames and Utah Hockey Club.
Now
the job begins, though.
“To
be honest, our mind is just game to game,” Blues defenseman Justin
Faulk said. “We’re going to go into Nashville and try to play a
real good solid, consistent game. That’s where we’re at right
now. We’re not looking ahead. We know what’s at stake and we know
what position we’ve put ourselves in, but we’re not there yet;
we’ve got to keep going. It’s a good feeling in here right now,
but we know it’s got to continue and there’s a lot of work left.
But there’s a good foundation that we’ve got to keep building off
of. There still needs to be a lot more wins, but I know there’s the
confidence in this group to go get it done.”
Making
up the eight-point deficit was hard enough. Now they have to continue
to apply pressure on those around them by winning games since the
Flames (two games) and the Canucks and Utah each has one game in
hand.
“We’ve
worked hard, we’ve clawed back, but at the end of the day, we have
14 left and you just can’t be happy that you’re in the wild card
or teams have games in hand,” Blues captain Brayden Schenn said.
“At the end of the day, you just need a strong week here. I thought
we did a heck of a job of flying on game day and coming out and
starting the way we did and all that type of stuff. We’ve got the
confidence right now. Guys are playing hard for one another and when
that happens, it’s a mindset where guys are doing whatever it takes
for each other right now and that’s how you win hockey games.”
-
- -
The
Blues have put together a run of 13 straight games in which they’ve
allowed an opponents fewer than 30 shots per game, their best stretch
since the Stanley Cup-winning season of 2018-19, and are second in the league (Florida Panthers are No. 1 at 23.4 per game) at 23.5 shots against per game.
How
have they done it?
“It’s
three zones,” Faulk said. “The forecheck is huge defensively. It
sets everything up coming through the neutral zone back into the
D-zone. It makes the defensive side of the game a lot easier if we
can get a good forecheck and we’ve been really focused on that
being consistent, getting pucks down below the goal line. It allows
us to spend more time in their zone and tire them out and make them
change in three-quarter ice. When we get into the D-zone, guys are
sacrificing, guys are blocking shots and doing things necessary to
limit chances and to limit those shots. It’s selfless hockey and
it’s been happening, and we’re going to continue that, I know
that.”
Also,
the forward lines will remain the same for the 14th
straight game, and had Colton Parayko (left knee) not injured himself
in a 3-2 shootout win against the Los Angeles Kings on March 5, the
defensive pairings likely would have remained the same as well.
“It
gets really good chemistry, and you see lines connecting a lot more
now,” Montgomery said. “They know where they’re going. On the
bench, they’re communicating every shift about what they could have
done better, how to create more scoring chances or talking about the
D-zone and how the centers are grabbing a hold of their lines. We’ll
switch when you hear my voice. You hear that kind of talk. It gets
them on the same page. They play a lot faster and the trust is
higher.”
-
- -
Joel
Hofer will get the start tonight, and Jordan Binnington will start
Thursday against the Canucks with the Blues playing such a hectic and
condensed schedule.
“Just
with the schedule and density of our games right now,” Montgomery
said. “We’ve just come off a couple of three in four’s; now
we’re going into four in six. I’ve said it all along, we have two
really good goaltenders, and we get ‘Hofe’ to go so everyone
stays fresh and gives us the best opportunity to get points every
night. And we get ‘Binner’ to go against Vancouver at home.”
-
- -
Blues
Projected Lineup:
Jake
Neighbours-Robert Thomas-Pavel Buchnevich
Dylan
Holloway-Brayden Schenn-Jordan Kyrou
Mathieu
Joseph-Oskar Sundqvist-Zack Bolduc
Alexey
Toropchenko-Radek Faksa-Nathan Walker
Cam
Fowler-Nick Leddy
Philip
Broberg-Justin Faulk
Ryan
Suter-Tyler Tucker
Joel
Hofer will start in goal; Jordan Binnington will be the backup.
Healthy
scratches include Alexandre Texier and Matthew Kessel. Colton Parayko
(knee) is out; Torey Krug (ankle) is out for the season.
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- -
Predators
Projected Lineup:
Filip
Forsberg-Ryan O'Reilly-Steven Stamkos
Michael Bunting-Colton
Sissons-Jonathan Marchessault
Luke Evangelista-Fedor Svechkov-Kiefer
Bellows
Zachary L'Heureux-Michael
McCarron-Cole Smith
Brady Skjei-Nick Blankenburg
Andreas Englund-Marc Del Gaizo
Jordan Oesterle-Justin Barron
Juuse Saros will
start in goal; Justus Annunen
will be the backup.
Healthy
scratches
include Spencer
Stastney and
Jakub Vrana.
Jeremy Lauzon (lower body), Adam Wilsby (upper body) and
Roman
Josi (upper body) are
out.
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Blues Prospect Report: Top Producers, Highlights From Past Week
With the St. Louis Blues on a heater and a schedule full of games, this week we'll take a look at some of the top performances from the organization's prospects (click on the hyperlinks for highlights):
* Juraj Pekarcik (third round, 2023) had a goal and three assists for first place Moncton of the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League in an 8-0 win against Saint John on Saturday.
* Quinton Burns (2023, third round) had two assists in back to back games for Kingston of the Ontario Hockey League on Friday and Sunday; Kingston topped Peterborough 8-2 on Friday and Ottawa, 3-2 in overtime, on Sunday, assisting on the game-winner.
* Dalibor Dvorsky (No. 10 overall, 2023) scored on Sunday for Springfield of the American Hockey League in a 4-1 loss against Providence, one of the stranger goals he'll ever get but it still counted as his 19th this season.
* Nikita Alexandrov (second round, 2019) scored one of the prettier goals -- and setups by Dvorsky -- of what amounted to be a lost weekend for the Thunderbirds on Saturday in an 8-3 loss to Syracuse. Alexandrov also had an assist in the game.
* Will McIsaac (fifth round, 2024) scored this effort goal last Wednesday for Spokane of the Western Hockey League in a 3-2 loss to Everett that at the time gave the defenseman a goal in three of four games.
* Tomas Mrsic (fourth round, 2024) is in the midst of his longest goal drought of the season (nine games) but the forward had four assists in a three-game point streak for Prince Albert of the WHL.
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Blues To Face Blackhawks In Puck Cancer Alumni Game
The St. Louis Blues alumni are hosting the second annual Puck Cancer - Second Shift Alumni game on Friday, April 4 at 7 p.m. at Centene Community Ice Center.
Blues alumni will face the Chicago Blackhawks alumni, with the proceeds to benefit Siteman Cancer Center and The V Foundation for Cancer Research.
Tickets are on sale now at ticketmaster.com – Search "Puck Cancer." The first game raised $600,000 for cancer research last year.
Tickets are $50 for general admission and $500 VIP tickets include all-inclusive food and beverage and access to a postgame party with players and celebrities.
The alumni playing include Kevin Shattenkirk, Alexander Steen, Steve Ott, Jim Montgomery, Mike Weber, Scottie Upshall, Mike Sillinger, Scott Mellanby, Paul Stastny, Chris Butler, Cam Janssen, Tyson Nash, Scott Young, Ray Whitney, Chris Chelios, Ed Belfour, Stu Grimson, Matthew Barnaby, and more.
Celebrity players include Dierks Bentley, country singer; Trevor Rosen with Old Dominion; Dave Coulier, actor best known for TV hit Full House; Billy Bush, radio and TV personality.
Coaches include Brett Hull, Chris Pronger, Al MacInnis, Keith Tkachuk, Joel Quenneville, Tony Twist, Darin Kimble and Tony Granato.
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 7-2 Win Against Ducks
ST.
LOUIS – The markings were set up for failure for the St. Louis
Blues on Sunday.
They
were coming off an impressive 5-1 win against the Minnesota Wild in
St. Paul, Minn., and a quick, short trip home was on the docket to
get ready for a quick turnaround less than 24 hours later on home ice
against the Anaheim Ducks.Captains
It
was anything but short. In fact, it was an unexpected extra night in
Minnesota, something the players and staff had no control over.
Feel
sorry for themselves? Not a chance. Not these surging Blues.
Instead,
they punched the Ducks in the mouth, for the 10th
straight meeting, and they did so emphatically, 7-2 at Enterprise
Center, for their ninth win the past 13 games (9-2-2) that vaulted
them into a tie with the Vancouver Canucks for the second time card
from the Western Conference.
We’ll
save the more pertinent details for the takeaways below, but the
Blues had mechanical issues with their plane and were grounded for
the night, having to travel back on gameday, which is a rarity. A 5
p.m. Central start time was pushed back to 7 p.m. and the Blues
(33-28-7) got right back on the horse and saddled up and punched the
Ducks (29-31-7) right in the mouth on Brayden Schenn’s 1,000th game
pre-game ceremony.
Seven
different players scored, including Dylan Holloway and Jake
Neighbours each with a goal and an assist, Jordan Kyrou collecting
three assists to match his hat trick in Minnesota, giving him six
points on back to back days.
Mathieu
Joseph scored shorthanded, the Blues scored a season-high three
power-play goals (Holloway, Oskar Sundqvist and Neighbours) and Radek
Faksa, Pavel Buchnevich and Schenn all scored, and Jordan Binnington
made 23 saves, as the Blues held an opponent to less than 30 shots,
which dates to Feb. 7 and is No. 1 in the NHL at 23.3 per game (the
Florida Panthers are No. 2 at 23.4).
Here
are Sunday’s Three Takeaways:
*
Overcoming travel issues – It’s unconventional to have to travel
on the same day as a game. The most recent memory was when the Blues
had to travel back on a gameday at home and face the San Jose Sharks,
a game the Blues lost 4-1.
A
flight back from Minneapolis/St. Paul is a little over an hour, and
the team was back in St. Louis just after 11 a.m., but the gameday
routine gets thrown all out of whack.
Would
the Blues have any legs, would they have the energy to not only play
the second of as back to back, but third in four days – again?
Well,
scoring 41 seconds into the game is quite the way to kickstart a
game, when Schenn, literally moments after being honored and
celebrated for his 1,000 games in the NHL with family on the ice, put
the Blues ahead 1-0, and then Buchnevich redirecting a Neighbours
pass past the nearside post on Lukas Dostal just 90 seconds in for a
2-0 lead.
Talk
about playing on the front foot with a high motor.
“I’m
very impressed, but as soon as they said something was wrong with our
plane, we couldn’t get home, and I said, ‘We’re going to win
tomorrow night,’ because it looks like our group is looking for
challenges right now and looking to accept them and overcome them,”
Blues coach Jim Montgomery said.
“Definitely
had a lot of adversity there. I think that’s the first time I’ve
done that, flying on a game day in the regular season. It was a great
game by us today.”
But
not an easy one, according to Justin Faulk.
“Today
was a tough one, I’ll be honest,” Faulk said. “I’m proud of
the guys how we showed up today. I know it wasn’t a great game for
sure, definitely was not our ‘A’ game, but given the
circumstances back to back, having to stay overnight, travel this
morning. There was room for excuses, and we always say, ‘There’s
no room for excuses in this game,’ and the guys showed up and did
enough to win and kind of put our foot down and make it a real good
weekend for us.”
*
Schenn putting a cap on his day – The captain had just had his two
little boys, Huxley and Braxton in his arms, getting a silver stick
from his dad, Jeff, and his wife Kelsey and mom Rita by his side. And
then giving the Blues a jolt, fittingly, he was then called into
action like everyone knows and expected.
Kyrou
was just blasted with a blindside hit by Ducks defenseman Jacob
Trouba, catching Kyrou on the side and just under the chin on his
right side in the defensive zone.
Schenn
immediately went into action against a tough cookie with a scrap.
It’s
what any captain would do, it’s what this captain would do for his
teammates.
“That’s
just instincts,” Schenn said. “You don’t actually kind of see
him laying there. You don’t know if he’s hurt, if he’s not. You
don’t really see the hit in real time. Just instincts (to) stick up
for a teammate. We’ve been doing that collectively as a team all
year.”
Schenn’s
been doing it since he donned the Bluenote in 2017.
“Yeah
it’s awesome,” Kyrou said. “There’s nothing much you can say
other than he’s just an unbelievable guy, unbelievable captain.
He’s done that for me multiple times in my career. I have nothing
but so much respect for him. He’s just awesome.”
If
you don’t think Schenn is respected in the locker room and with his
teammates, Faulk was wearing a ‘10’ hat and Schenn 1,000 games
cutoff-sleeved shirt to prove his value.
“That’s
a Brayden Schenn game,” Faulk said. “I’m wearing the shirt and
hat again. He means a lot to this group, there’s no doubt about
that what he means to the team, the organization, the city. Each guy
individually, he does everything for everybody. I think if you want
to pick anyone in the city that said, ‘If that guy qualified to be
the captain of the Blues and represent this city and what sports and
what this city’s all about, the character,’ he’s that guy. For
him to go do that tonight, score right away, step up for Kyrou, get
in a fight, I know he’s got a lot of people in town and that’s
just who he is as a person and as a teammate and a guy. Not to say I
don’t expect anything different, but he’s just a quality, quality
person. I’m really happy for him.
“He
just happened to be the closest guy obviously and surprise! His
timing was perfect for that. I wouldn’t have questioned if that was
going to happen. That’s his character, that’s his personality, he
stands up for anybody at any time. He means a lot to this group and
we’re real happy for him.”
Montgomery
compared Schenn with Blues greats.
“Not
only embody the spirit of the Blues,” Montgomery
said.
“With all the players that I've mentioned that have been warriors
for years, why the Blues do have a great tradition. Plagers,
Federkos, [Garry]
Unger,
[Brian]
Sutter,
[Perry]
Turnbull,
Brett Hull shows up, Scott Stevens is here, Brendan Shanahan, [Chris]
Pronger,
[Al]
MacInnis,
[Scott]
Mellanby,
[Keith]
Tkachuk,
[Barret]
Jackman.
There's so many guys that have let an imprint and I think when you
look at Brayden Schenn, the way he plays the game, he has the skill,
the will, he fights, he checks. I tip my hat off to him because he's
made my job a lot easier coming in here the way he grabs a hold of
that dressing room.”
Schenn,
sporting red marks on his face from his tilt with Trouba, was only
missing that assist for his third-ever Gordie Howe hat trick.
“Special
day, special night obviously scoring on the first shift,” Schenn
said. “You play a lot of hockey and you usually don’t score on
the first shift, and tonight with family and friends here and after
the ceremony, pretty cool with how it all works out. Most
importantly, we got the job done tonight and continue to climb up the
standings.”
*
A scorching power play – Don’t look now, but Montgomery called
it, and called it right.
“It’s
been like this for a while, like since the outdoor game [2025
Discover NHL Winter Classic],” the Blues coach said of the man
advantage. “If you look at what our power play has done since then,
I bet you it’s top four in the league.”
He’s
100 percent correct. The Blues are fourth in the NHL since Dec. 31
with a 29.9 percent efficiency after going 3-for-5 on Sunday, giving
them multiple games with power play goals in two of the last three
games (they had just two multiple power-play games in the first 65
games).
They’re
5-for-9 the past three games and it got started on their second
attempt when Holloway ripped a Faulk one-timer from just inside the
top of the right circle at 8:09 of the second period for a 3-0 lead.
The
puck movement was so crisp when Neighbours beat former Blue Ville
Husso at 6:18 of the third period for a 6-2 lead, then Sundqvist
one-timed a slam dunk from the left of the goal at 12:19 to make it
7-2.
Why
is it going so well lately?
“I
think we’ve got two pretty competitive units right now,” Kyrou
said. “It’s kind of like we’re almost battling against each
other, see who can try to score. It’s a really good, competitive
nature to try to have. I think that’s good. We’re also just
attacking the net more I think. We’re not really looking to make
the three, four passes, backdoor passes. We’re kind of just
shooting, crashing then net, getting rebounds and creating from
there.”
Whether
the personnel has been tinkered with or execution has changed, the
unit is a bonafide threat.
“The
way we’re converging at the net and we’re keeping guys low,”
Montgomery said. “We didn’t score on three plays on the power
play today that are indicative to me of a power play that is clicking
… there was a play by Schenn to the backdoor to 63 [Neighbours]
that didn’t go in, and there was a play right before we scored, the
Sundqvist goal, where [Robert] Thomas went backdoor to ‘Sunny.’
“Those
kind of plays where you’re making penetrating passes to scoring
areas that are basically tap-ins on the backdoor, that really makes a
penalty kill shrink, which opens up the top and now you have a lot of
options, and our players are executing at a high level and I think
[assistant coach] Steve Ott’s done a tremendous job.”
*
As an added bonus to the Three Takeaways, it’s important to note
that Montgomery didn’t like stretches of the Blues’ game when it
was 3-1, but the shift when Faksa scored to make it 4-1 at 15:39 of
the second came off a pure hustle play by Nathan Walker from center
ice, winning a race for the puck with talented young Ducks D-man
Jackson LaCombe to keep a puck alive behind the goal line, working a
give-and-go with Faksa, who finished Walker’s backhand pass through
the crease.
But
that’s what’s happening with this team right now, these kinds of
hustle plays.
“Yes,
and it’s permeated through the lineup,” Montgomery said. “It’s
everybody doing it. That line has been doing it all year, and those
habits and details are what got players like Walker in the league and
why we value him so much, and it’s nice to see that those kind of
habits are just going right through the lineup right now.
“…
When
it went 3-1 there, I didn’t like our game a little bit for a while,
then 'Faksi’s like went right out there and got the momentum back
and they got that goal. The way we get back to our identity and the
way we have success, it’s the maturity of the team I guess, how we
manage games in that combination. That shows the maturity of our
group. It’s not easy to go out there at the end of three in four
and travel against a team that’s rested and beat them up 7-2.”
And
the second hustle and grit play came from Sundqvist, who was
determined to win a puck from his knees in the D-zone that sprung
Joseph for a 2-on-1 with Sundqvist joining, and Joseph wired a
wrister that made it 5-1 at 18:10 of the second.
“It’s
been awesome. Obviously winning is awesome,” Kyrou said. “We love
winning in this building, playing in front of our fans. It’s good
that we’re doing that and we just want to keep that up.”
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Three Takeaways From Blues' 5-1 Win Against Wild
The St. Louis Blues closed out their longest road trip of the season in emphatic style.
They shook off a tough loss against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday with a solid effort all-around on Saturday, led by Jordan Kyrou's fifth NHL hat trick and his second straight against the Minnesota Wild in a 5-1 win at Xcel Energy Center on Saturday.
The Blues remain two points behind the Vancouver Canucks, who defeated the the Chicago Blackhawks 6-2 late Saturday night, but St. Louis (32-28-7) are tied in points with the Calgary Flames, who have two games in hand (Vancouver has one) and two points ahead of Utah Hockey Club (one game in hand).
Brayden Schenn had a goal and an assist, Cam Fowler, Robert Thomas and Pavel Buchnevich each had two asssists, and Joel Hofer, making his first career start against the Wild (37-25-5) made 18 saves.
The Blues closed the trip with a 3-2-1 mark and now will play nine of their final 15, including on Sunday against the Anaheim Ducks, a game originally slated to begin at 5 p.m. (CT) but has now been moved back to 7 p.m. due to travel complications by the Blues returning from Minnesota.
The Blues, for the first time in the history of matchups with the Wild, were faced with being swept in a season series.
Since the Wild made its way into the league in 2000-01, playing its 24th season in 2024-25 and had never swept the Blues in a season series.
Minnesota won the first three matchups (4-1 in St. Louis on Oct. 15, 4-2 in St. Louis on Nov. 19 and 6-4 in Minnesota on Jan. 7) and were looking for their first-ever sweep of the Blues but it was not to be.
Minnesota was missing some weaponry in this game (Kirill Kaprozov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Jonas Brodin), but the Blues were missing Colton Parayko on the back end.
By Montgomery throwing Hofer at Minnesota, a goalie the Wild had never seen before, there's the notion of having to get used to someone's tendencies rather than facing Jordan Binnington, someone Minnesota is quite familiar with. And yes, Hofer was one zone exit away from possibly getting a shutout that resulted in a Jacob Middleton goal that made it 3-1 at 12:47 of the second period, but Hofer was solid otherwise.
Let's dive into Saturday's Three Takeaways:
* More net front presence, middle lane drives -- Despite outplaying the Penguins on Thursday, including owning a 36-22 advantage on the shot clock, the Blues and coach Jim Montgomery lamented that there wasn't enough of a net front presence in front of Tristan Jarry, not enough of a middle lane drive to the net that had made them so successful in going 7-2-2 the previous 11 games.
Consider the message delivered.
Schenn's goal at 4:17 of the first was a perfect example of what the Blues needed against a stingy defensive-minded team that has had issues scoring goals.
The Blues had an extended shift in the Wild zone, one of many throughout the first period, and were able to control the zone enough that a pair of line changes were made, but when the puck was played to Fowler at the left point, he threw it towards the net knowing Schenn was going there. The Blues captain was able to maneuver past Frederick Gaudreau, collect the loose puck and backhand it in past Filip Gustavsson for a 1-0 lead.
On Neighbours goal, same thing. Robert Thomas wins the face-off back high, puck goes low, quick pass to the slot for a one-time shot by Thomas, and Neighbours is the backside forward driving the net and yes, it was a fortuitous bounce off a block by Zach Bogosian, but if Neighbours isn't driving the net, he doesn't score, but he did and potted the puck to make it 2-0 at 10:51 of the second period.
And for Kyrou to kickstart his night to make it 3-0 at 12:22 of the second, it was another face-off win high, puck worked low, thrown to the net, but Kyrou is the middle lane driver crashing to the goal and he made no mistake when Gustavsson pushed the rebound right into his pathway.
* Holding another opponent under 30 shots -- It says that defense pays, and for the Blues, it paid off once again on Saturday.
For the 12th straight game, they held an opponent under 30 shots and have allowed an average of 23.4 shots per game in that stretch, which is second in the NHL behind the Florida Panthers (23.2).
The last team to get 30-plus shots: the Panthers, who had 34 on Feb. 6. But including that game, the Blues allowed 30 or more in four of the five prior to this run of 12 straight.
Quite frankly, Saturday was a defensive masterclass of not allowing traffic, no middle lane drives and taking away shooting lanes with 19 blocks.
* Kyrou owning the Wild -- Coming into the game, Kyrou had 23 points (12 goals, 11 assists) in 22 career games against the Wild, and he loves playing at the Xcel Energy Center.
With Saturday's performance, it stands at 15 goals, 11 assists in 23 games now.
He made it 4-1 at 11:30 of the third period with a breakout of the puck, then slicing past Declan Chisholm and Vinnie Hinostroza, flying around the right edge with speed and catching Gustavsson over-commiting before wrapping the backhand in to make it 4-1.
And in style, Kyrou scored into the empty net at 17:40 to make it 5-1. And it could have been more with Kyrou having 12 shot attempts in the game but six of them were blocked.
Kyrou's last hat trick also came against the Wild in the very same building, on March 23, 2024.
* Click here to see what Montgomery and players had to say after the game.
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