Going into this week, St. Louis Blues fans thought there were easy points in the bag. Unfortunately the western Canada trip turned out to be a disappointment and could have doomed the Blues in the standings.
The St. Louis Blues were flying high from the previous week with strong wins over Chicago and Anaheim at home and then going on the road and taking care of business against the Dallas Stars. A trip to western Canada to face three of the worst teams, record wise, in the Western Conference should have been a walk in the park.
The Blues got a ton of bad bounces against Calgary to start the week, but even the players admitted they may have been overconfident.
Jake Allen somewhat ripped into the squad for the lackadaisical play. “I think we didn’t give them enough respect,” said Allen. “…they put it to us, we got what we deserved.”
Unfortunately the Blues did not heed the words of their goaltender or likely their coach and they came out with as little energy the next game against Edmonton. While the offense kept up it’s pace, the penalty kill was dreadful and the team lost 6-4.
They put it to us, we got what we deserved. – Jake Allen
Throw out the opponents’ record, it was a worrying streak even though it was only two losses. For whatever reason, the Blues’ special teams fell apart. They gave up two shorthanded goals against Calgary and five powerplay goals over those first two games.
Fortunately the Blues turned it around against the Vancouver Canucks. While it is true that the Blues were playing against an extremely undermanned Vancouver team, it was still a positive win. The Blues could not take advantage of their previous cellar-dwellar opponents, so dominating the way they did against the Canucks was more of what the team needed to do in the other games.
Blues’ Weekly Stats:
Scottie Upshall – 1G 0A 1P
Jori Lehtera – 0G 3A 3P
Robby Fabbri – 0G 2A 2P
Jaden Schwartz – 2G 3A 5P
Paul Stastny – 2G 2A 4P
Troy Brouwer – 1G 2A 3P
Magnus Paajarvi – 0G 1A 1P
Ryan Reaves – 0G 1A 1P
Patrik Berglund – 1G 0A 1P
David Backes – 2G 0A 2P
Vladimir Tarasenko – 1G 1A 1P
Joel Edmunson – 0G 1A 1P
Kevin Shattenkirk – 1G 1A 1P
Alex Pietrangelo – 0G 1A 1P
Colton Parakyo – 0G 2A 2P
Jake Allen – 34 saves/43 shots, .791 save percentage, 5.99 goals against
Brian Elliott – 19 shots/19 saves, 1.000 save percentage, 0.00 goals against
Anders Nilsson – 12 saves/14 saves, .857 save percentage, 4.42 goals against
View from the Midwest Division Recap
Looking Forward
The St. Louis Blues have some tough games coming up this week, but maybe that’s a good thing given how they played against the lesser ones.
They’ll start the week in San Jose as they finally finish up a five game road trip that spanned parts of three weeks. The Sharks are currently in third in the Pacific Davision but are only one point (as of writing this article) behind the Ducks, so they have plenty to play for.
The Blues then come home for a game against the Canucks on Saturday and then have to catch the red-eye to go east and play the league-leading Washington Capitals on Sunday. Not only will that matchup pit them against the top team in the NHL but it will also be the first time the Blues play against fan-favorite, TJ Oshie.
Next: Is Tarasenko Taken for Granted?
Last week seemed to be an easy setup and the perfect way for the Blues to take over the division lead. Instead they fell behind the Stars and now have some really difficult opponents on the docket.
Hopefully that will be a good thing since the Blues have a bad habit of playing up or down to their opposition. One way or the other, the standings might look incredibly different come next week.