St. Louis Blues: Special Teams Throwing Away Valuable Points

Forgive this article if it devolved into a rant, however the last game at Rexall Place against the Edmonton Oilers left many fans wondering why they stayed up late including yours truly.  For the second game in a row, the St. Louis Blues’ special teams unit cost them the game.

For whatever reason, the St. Louis Blues have lacked energy and pop in two straight games on their western Canadian swing.  While they did not look quite as lowly as they did in Calgary, the Blues were playing an even worse team in the Edmonton Oilers and got the same result.

The energy was a little bit better overall in Edmonton, but St. Louis just shot themselves in the foot way too many times in Alberta.  The sad thing is it should have been expected.  Right from the get go, the Blues gave two breakaways to Connor McDavid and only some strong saves by Jake Allen kept the game scoreless.  In the same breath, the Blues could have easily conceded more goals than they did against Calgary.

Nevertheless, the wheels came off.  While the way the Blues played against each team was different, it was still like watching mirror images in terms of the outcomes.  Lackluster starts combined with dumb penalties and just seeming flatfooted.

The Blues, as is their way, gave fans hope throughout the night against both Calgary and Edmonton.  After falling down 2-0 against the Oilers, they rallied back and actually tied it up.  It seemed like things might be turning for the better.  Not quite.

St. Louis has seen a combination of both bad officiating and worse play during the last couple games.  Despite that, you have to figure out a way stay out of the penalty box.  The lowly Oilers’ powerplay made the supposedly vaunted Blues’ penalty kill look like chumps.

The Oilers rattled off three straight goals on the man-advantage to push their advantage to 5-2 before the second period was through.  On the heels of allowing two embarrassing short handed tallies, the special teams has taken a nose dive after being top five on both sides.

Coming into this recent road trip, the Blues had seen their special teams units both creep up into the top five.  The penalty kill was even best in the league for a brief time.  Now, in two games, they’ve put their heads so far up their butts that they need those little hats with lights on the top.

The Blues powerplay and penalty kill are still ranked in the top 10, but it just has never seemed as though they are that good.  It seems to be a St. Louis thing to have top ranked things only for them to really be fool’s gold.  The Cardinals did it a few years ago when they led the league in runs but it was feast or famine.

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They would win 15-1 or lose 2-0.  It’s the same now with the Blues’ special teams, the powerplay in particular.  They’ll go games without and were quite embarrassing toward the start of the season, but then will get three here or two there to get their percentage up.

Unfortunately, you can shine up a dog turd all you want but it’s going to end up a turd in the end.

The Blues could not take advantage of their own powerplays in Calgary and could not stay out of the box in both cities.  It becomes even more important because the Blues were pretty much unable to complete the comeback on both nights due to penalties.

Again mirroring the finish to the Calgary game, the Blues ended the Edmonton tie with a five minute boarding penalty and game misconduct handed out to Troy Brouwer with under six minutes to play.

While the call was apparently correct given the fact the Oilers’ player was bleeding, I honestly begin to wonder if hockey players have got razor blades in their wrist tape and “gig” like old-school wrestlers because I just don’t see his face hitting the boards.  Looked like the glass if anything, but nothing that would have made him bleed.  It is what it is at this point.

Blame the officials, the team, the management, the coach, me, the guy down the street…doesn’t matter.  The Blues have now fallen 7-4 and 6-4 to the two worst teams in the Western Conference.  They have one game to salvage this Canadian trip against the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday.

Perhaps they’ll win since they aren’t playing against a team in last place.  Maybe some five-on-five hockey will be a novel idea as well.

Negatives from the last two games:

• The special teams.  Yes, the Blues got a powerplay goal but one game after allowing two shorthanded goals, they allow Edmonton to go 4-6 on the man-advantage.  What makes that even worse was the Oilers had three powerplay goals in their last 15 games and were 1-32 on the powerplay heading into this game with St. Louis.  The Blues have needed to stay out of the box all season long, too often taking bone-headed penalties at inopportune times.  Until lately though, they’ve been able to overcome them.
• Jake Allen was not really to blame on most of the goals against Edmonton, but he was not on his game for either game.  Sadly, it proves how much the Blues have relied on their goaltending that on nights when the goalies aren’t on the team doesn’t pick them up.
• Despite the refs or the penalties, the Blues should have tied it on both occasions.  Against Calgary they allowed a terrible short handed goal on the breakaway.  Then they got a two-on-one break late in the game against Edmonton and Alex Pietrangelo got his stick tied up and was unable to put the puck into an empty net.

Positives:

• The Blues are scoring.  They have 34 goals in their last 8 games.
• They found a way to come back against both teams and were unfortunate to not finish it off.
• David Backes scored two goals.  In addition to his offensive uptick, he was physical and looks like a player to be reckoned with.  Also, with Patrik Berglund‘s goal that line looks like it will be hard to stop if/when Alexander Steen can rejoin it.

Next: NHL Should Expand Replay

Final Thoughts:

St. Louis has to get this figured out.  It’s too late in the season and the points are too important for playoff seeding.  I keep hearing from Darren Pang about them looking tired and if that’s the case then it’s over already.  Everyone is tired at this point but the good teams push through it.

The Blues are fortunate that their recent swings in mood have coincided with the teams they’re competing with.  Chicago and Dallas seem to lose when the Blues drop points, keeping them near the top but that will only hold so long.

You can’t have such wild swings in momentum in the playoffs.  Six game win streaks are great but you can’t follow that up with losing streaks of two or more.  Hopefully the next game is better because as great as this team looks when it is winning, they look like they’ll get swept in the playoffs if they play how they have when they get to losing.