The St. Louis Blues, who reached the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time since 2022, went 19-4-3 after the 4 Nations Face-Off. (Jeff Le-Imagn Images) [https://deweb-519a7.b-cdn.net/post-images/cd9a6613-c6dd-407a-a9e1-c23789865098.jpeg] The St. Louis Blues, who reached the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time since 2022, went 19-4-3 after the 4 Nations Face-Off. (Jeff Le-Imagn Images) ST. LOUIS – For the St. Louis Blues [http://thn.com/stlouis] to accomplish what nobody thought they could do coming out of the 4 Nations Face-Off on Feb. 22 was nothing short of remarkable. And even in going 19-4-3, good for a .788 points percentage, it still took until the final game of the regular season to punch their ticket to the Stanley Cup playoffs. That’s just the degree of difficulty of gaining entry into the playoffs as the second wild card from the Western Conference, no less, was what it took to get this done. So how did it happen? Coach Jim Montgomery knows. “Great leadership, led by our captain who scored the first goal tonight,” Montgomery said, referring to Brayden Schenn. “I thought consistency by the staff and the players with our communication and I just thought that we grew so much culturally and in our team identity. And those two things, when our players started using words like togetherness. The words I used were their words this morning. Selfless, sacrifice, love.” Let’s start at the top: When Montgomery was hired to replace Drew Bannister on Nov. 25, mere days after being fired by the Boston Bruins [http://thn.com/boston], the Blues were 9-12-1 and sort of running amuck, through a quagmire of sorts. And sure, there was a coaching surge initially, winning five of their first seven games under Montgomery, but then there were also challenges of not being able to string wins together regularly. Consistency was a topic of discussion. The Blues were the last team in the NHL to put together a three-game winning streak this season. How could they possibly be a playoff team, let alone be considered to be taken seriously? Their coach stayed the course, and the players bought in. “System, positivity, always great to be around, believing in you, how you’re a good player, let you do stuff in the offensive zone,” forward Pavel Buchnevich said of Montgomery. “Everybody was super-pumped when ‘Monty’ was coming. Half of the team know him from previous work here (2020-22 as an assistant coach under Craig Berube) and we know how good he is as a coach and even a better person.” The Blues won their last game prior to the 4 Nations, 6-5 against the Chicago Blackhawks [http://thn.com/chicago], and came out of the gates and dropped a 4-3 shootout loss against their first-round playoff opponent, the Winnipeg Jets [http://thn.com/winnipeg], a game in which they led in the final minute of regulation. It’s a game in which the Blues liked more so than the one they lost, but then on the following night on Feb. 23, the team began a stretch of what’s laid the foundation for where they are now, winning six of seven before starting their franchise-record 12-game winning streak on March 15, and here we are. “A lot goes into it,” Schenn said after scoring his 18th and final goal of the regular season Tuesday. “This is what you train for in the summer, and this is what you play for all year -- to have a chance at the Stanley Cup. You just have to get in and anything can happen. We saw that years ago. We've been on a good run here and, at the same time, we just can't be happy that we're in. Playing Winnipeg, Winnipeg is obviously a good team and they're going to present a good challenge for us. But I don't think anyone gave us a chance really, where we were. I'm glad we kept it together. They're too many good pieces in this locker room to not get in the playoffs. We felt if we played hard for one another, we can get the job done and it just took 82 games.” Several things stood out, too many to name. “I mean, there's a lot of things,” Schenn said. “I've talked about it all along, guys being selfless, playing hard for one another. Something we've been trying to do for a couple of years now ... when you start winning hockey games, you actually start getting more individual results and guys feel better about themselves individually and about the team. It's just a mindset that you have to come in and play for a team and good things happen when you do that. It's nice to be in and some pressure relieved of how the past week’s gone, and it's nice to seal it that way.” In goal, things tightened up as well between Jordan Binnington and Joel Hofer. At the break, Binnington was 15-19-4 with a 2.89 goals-against average and .897 save percentage. Hofer was 10-7-1, 2.88 GAA and .903 save percentage. From the break on, Binnington was 13-1-1 with a 2.10 GAA and .910 save percentage; Hofer went 6-1-2 with a 2.19 GAA and .904 save percentage. When the Blues lost Colton Parayko on March 5 to a left knee injury that required it to be scoped in a 3-2 shootout win against the Los Angeles Kings [http://thn.com/la], much hope was lost. Parayko was having a career season offensively and leading the Blues in minutes played. But instead of playing the oh-woe-is-me card, the Blues went on a 13-3-1 run without their top defenseman, who returned on Saturday in a 4-3 shootout loss at the Seattle Kraken [http://thn.com/seattle]. The Blue line held it together, including Cam Fowler, who was acquired from the Anaheim Ducks [http://thn.com/anaheim] on Dec. 14 and chose St. Louis because he thought he would win here. The 33-year-old, who last played in the playoffs in 2016-17, really helped fuel his career with an incredible run with the Blues from the moment he played his first game. “There’s a lot that goes into it,” Fowler said. “We looked at the makeup of the team and where I could come in and try and make an impact. You just look at the players they have, guys that have won the Stanley Cup (Schenn, Parayko, Oskar Sundqvist, Robert Thomas, Binnington), world class goaltending, high-end players offensively. I just felt like it was a good fit for me and my family and I’m grateful that they trusted me to come in here and try and help this team. It’s been a heck of a ride for the last few months and I feel like I’ve been here much longer than that just by the way everyone’s treated me and the guys that we have in this locker room. I’m thankful for that and looking forward to the opportunity of playing in the playoffs again.” The Blues were third in goals against average at 2.31 per game, behind the Jets (2.20) and Kings (2.29) since the break. From a forward perspective, it starts with Robert Thomas. Thomas finished the season with a 12-game point streak (four goals, 21 assists) and was tied for second in the NHL since Feb. 1 in points with 45 (nine goals, 36 assists) behind Tampa Bay Lightning forward Nikita Kucherov (46 points; 14 goals, 32 assists) and Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak (45 points; 19 goals, 26 assists). Thomas is first since the 4 Nations break with 40 points (eight goals, 32 assists); Jordan Kyrou was a point-per-game player (26 points; 13 goals, 13 assists) in 26 games; the injured Dylan Holloway (lower-body injury suffered April 3 against the Pittsburgh Penguins) had 23 points (10 goals, 13 assists) in 21 games, followed by Pavel Buchnevich, who also had 23 points (nine goals, 14 assists) in 22 games; Fowler had 22 points (three goals, 19 assists) in 25 games, and Jake Neighbours had 21 points (nine goals, 12 assists) in 26 games. The Blues were No. 1 in the NHL since the break averaging 3.81 goals per game. “I feel like break really help us,” said Buchnevich, who scored in six of the final eight games. “Everybody kind of (reset) thinking how their game (is) going and now we start playing for each other, support everywhere, sacrifice blocking shots. You look at all lines, everybody contribute. We come (together) as a team, but everybody like to be around (each other). It’s positive energy every time and it’s helped us.” And let’s not discount the young guys, like Zack Bolduc, who tied Kyrou for most goals since the break (13). Bolduc finished the season with 19 goals, and Jimmy Snuggerud, playing in just his sixth game since coming out of college at the University of Minnesota, had a goal and an assist, his first NHL goal and multi-point game, in a 6-1 convincing win [https://thehockeynews.com/nhl/st-louis-blues/latest-news/three-takeaways-from-blues-6-1-win-against-utah-hockey-club] over Utah Hockey Club [http://thn.com/utah] on Tuesday to punch their ticket. “What they’ve learned is what it takes to win in this league,” Montgomery said. “It’s such a great experience to understand the grind and the mental grind, more than a physical grind, that it takes to win battles, to win every foot of ice in this league that’s the greatest league in the world in big moments and being able to come through in big moments. This is going to give us years of good vibes because the experience of learning how to win, it’s not easy to find that in the league.” For Snuggerud, it’s gone fast, but it’s been enjoyable. “It's cool, honestly,” he said. “I grew up watching hockey and the dream goal is to play in the Stanley Cup playoffs and to have this group in here to do it with, it's so special. It should be a fun upcoming few weeks.” And now they go in playing with house money as the underdogs against the Presidents’ Trophy winners and Central Division winners. “Everyone looks at Winnipeg and that's the first-place team in the league,” Schenn said. “We've got a lot of work to do, they're a good team and they don't give up much. You don't really pay attention to Winnipeg a whole lot, and then I started watching when my brother [Luke] got traded there and they're a good defensive hockey team with a good goalie. It's going to be an exciting series and we're looking forward to the challenge.”
