St. Louis Blues Top 10 Moments Of 2018-19 NHL Playoffs

1. Maroon’s OT winner in Game 7 vs Dallas

Other people will put other moments higher and that is their right. This is all subjective.

However, for me, this moment might be in the top two or three for everything, including the Stanley Cup Final. That is a discussion for another day, however.

For now, it suffices to say that this moment was that rare bit in hockey where it all pans out just like you dreamed it might. That does not always happen.

Hockey is different than sports like football or basketball, or even baseball really. Those sports have a defining moment where it can come down to one play or one possession such as a final shot before the buzzer or a hail Mary pass or a walkoff homerun.

It is different in hockey because there are so few moments that truly and definitively end a game. You have game winning goals, but those can come in the opening seconds of the first period.

You have game saving stops by goaltenders, but like defense in baseball, those don’t get the same accolades across time. Hockey ends when the game hits zero, so you don’t have that pass sailing through the air or the shot just barely having left the fingertips.

What you do have is overtime. Sudden death is such a harsh word, but when it comes in a Game 7, that is truly what it means for the season of the team that loses. Everyone sits on the edge of their seats, if they are sitting at all. Every shot or deflection or turnover could be the thing that spells your doom or seals your glory.

For the Blues, they only got one of those moments. In the Dallas series, it went all the way to a seventh game and it required a second overtime to seal it off.

We already discussed how it almost did not even make it there. But, that moment did happen and thus this game did get to overtime.

It was not highlight reel hockey either. It was 1-1 for more than an entire game’s worth of hockey.

The last goal came with four minutes left in the first period. It then went three full periods with no goals, but it was not dull hockey by any stretch of the imagination.

Ben Bishop ended up making 52 saves in that game. Binnington was not as busy, but still made 29 and most were of decent quality.

The problem for the Blues was they dominated the game overall and yet they looked poised to have that same old fluky ending happen to them. The story was tailor made for it to all be about Bishop stealing it and another disappointment for St. Louis.

Instead, the third line for the Blues flipped the script. Instead of it being about bitter disappointment, it was all about storybook endings.

Not quite six minutes into the second overtime, the Blues won a key faceoff. It was the rookie Robert Thomas that took the step from outside the circle to the doorstep and clanked one off the post.

After that, the hometown hero, Pat Maroon would finish things off.

Everything about that moment was perfect. You get the ending every hockey player dreams of, to end the series with an overtime goal in Game 7. You got the kid who grew up in St. Louis, going to Blues games, being the one to score it.

Even everything afterward was just perfect. This moment ranks so highly for me because you could see how everyone had grown together.

The way all the players swamped one another, this was not just another win. The way Maroon went over to the bench after it all and bear-hugged his coach was not just a regular coach/player relationship. It showed there was so much more there.

Craig Berube is a pretty stoic person. That is not to say he does not have a sense of humor, but the public and fans get to see it on rare occasion. The size of his smile right before that hug was immeasurable.

It was the culmination of a series, but also the start of a string of events that had us all believing. Surely it could be no coincidence that number seven scored in Game 7 on May 7 in a game scheduled to start at 7.

There were so many odd and wonderful coincidences or signs after that, but this was the one that really lit the fire under the team and fans and had us all twitching with giddy excitement.

The Blues would have 13 more games and eight more wins in front of them after this one. Even so, it was one of the biggest and most memorable playoff moments in the team’s history…that is until those eight wins were achieved.