Good morning Blues fans! Our favorite team, and for many of us favorite sport, is back after a week of nothingness. It’s about time.
Who knew that five days without hockey, well without the St. Louis Blues could be so long. While there are plenty of other things to watch and personally, I got some stuff done around the house, it was a long time without Blues hockey.
Now they return. And what a welcome back present they get from the NHL.
The Blues have to play the red-hot Chicago Blackhawks. Welcome back indeed…
St. Louis has a hard enough time coming off the bye-week. Teams coming off their bye-week have five wins this season. Columbus was the fifth and the first in a long time with a 7-0 win yesterday.
Then you throw the Blackhawks into the mix. Chicago has won their last three games and scored 16 goals in those games.
They have also taken the victory in seven of their last eight games. The Hawks have scored an average of five goals per game in those wins too.
So, a team that has been shaky defensively (their recent win streak not withstanding), coming off five days where they could not even skate going against a team at the top of their game. Good luck to all of us.
Winning is not impossible for the Blues. In fact, they are currently 2-2 against Chicago and 1-0 against the Hawks at the United Center.
Unfortunately, that win came way back at the start of the season. Chicago had a slow roll out to their season and the Blues flamed out after a hot start. Still, you’ve got to hang your hat on something right now.
Also on the bright side, the Blues have done nothing according to plan this year. Instead of seeing their coach out in style, they got him fired.
Instead of trading their biggest asset when it made sense, they hesitated. Instead of having a slow transition, the Blues shot out of the gate with the coaching change.
So, why not buck the trend and join the Blue Jackets in the big win club? St. Louis can’t waste time getting back into the swing of things now that they’ve been passed up in the standings.
Finishing in a wild card spot might not be so bad, perhaps even preferable. However, the Blues are in the final spot right now and that means facing Minnesota.
The Blues need to play well even if they don’t win. That might be hard enough as it is.
Here are your St. Louis Blues Morning Links to get your day started off right.
Most of the time, we link to stories in this section. However, this stuff was too good not to simply embed. Blues prospect Vince Dunn took exception to a hit and doled out some punishment during a Chicago Wolves game. Things did not end on the ice though, but Dunn finished it.
Follow things on Twitter for some entertaining responses.
The St. Louis Blues made one of their expected recalls from the Chicago Wolves. Magnus Paajarvi is back. With his name being the only one, Ivan Barbashev’s injury is more than serious than we had hoped even if it only keeps him out of one game. (Fox Sports)
Say what you will about Kevin Shattenkirk nixing two separate trades that would have substantially helped the Blues. Heaven knows I said plenty. You can’t be too mad a the actual person though because he’s taking the high road, which is something we should applaud and want more often from our sports players. (STLToday)
With the Blues celebrating their 50th Anniversary, the new Las Vegas team would love to do next year what the Blues did in their first year. Current landscapes make that kind of jump from expansion to finals almost impossible. (Post-Dispatch)
Next: Rangers Might Be Blues Only Hope
You can argue the talent levels of Patrick Eaves and Keven Shattenkirk until you are blue in the face. The bottom line is the standard for a trade return may have been set pretty low when Eaves was sent out west. (ESPN)
The Los Angeles Kings are currently out of the playoff picture. They got a huge piece back from injury in their push to regain a final spot though and he helped the team win last night. (NHL)