Following the St. Louis Blues somewhat impressive victory over the Nashville Predators, the prevailing thought was they needed to keep things rolling. They could not just give it right back in their next game. Well, they gave it right back.
The Buffalo Sabres rolled into town riding an eight-game win streak. I won't bury the lead - the Sabres have now won nine in a row.
Things got off to a less than stellar start with Buffalo taking the lead less than three minutes in off a wrist shot. The Blues failed to get the puck out of the zone the first time, got a second opportunity and turned the puck over at the blue line. This time it led to a two-on-one and the Sabres buried the backdoor chance.
St. Louis rallied well and even answered about three minutes later. The Blues created a rush play after a good stick by Jordan Kyrou. Otto Stenberg tapped it to Brayden Schenn on the left wing and he scored to tie it.
Three minutes after that, the Blues took a 2-1 lead. Jimmy Snuggerud won a board battle along the endboards, Robby Fabbri backhanded one off the goalie's pad and then somehow Snuggerud slammed it home on the rebound. I still have no clue how the puck went in, but the Blues had a lead and were playing pretty well in the first period.
You could see it start to taper off in the remaining 12 minutes and the Blues took a penalty at the very end of the period. Although St. Louis killed it off to start the second period, St. Louis never recovered.
The Blues had seven shots in the second period, but those came in short bursts in the second half of the second frame. St. Louis allowed 14 shots and several chances. Eventually, they broke down and Alex Tuch tied the game with about five minutes left in the second. The Blues won an offensive-zone faceoff, but Logan Mailloux sent a pass up the wing that exploded off Pavel Buchnevich's skate. The Sabres came down the other way and Tuch rifled one past the blocker.
The Blues had been badly outplayed in the second period, but that's typically their worst period and it was all still there in the third. The team let the air out of the building by allowing the go-ahead goal less than two minutes into the third.
Buffalo transitioned into the offensive zone with quick passing and no resistance from the Blues. The Sabres threw a blind pass into the middle, which was deflected by Jack Quinn. Quinn was open because Zach Benson had driven strong to the back post, drawing Cam Fowler with him and Dalibor Dvorsky was a little late. Unfortunately, Quinn merely knocked the puck in midair where Benson managed to swat it in from below the goal line. People will blame Fowler, but by the time the puck got knocked in, there was nothing he could do.
Regardless, the Blues were down by a goal early and needed to focus on offense. Surely, they'd get a mad push the rest of the game, right? The Blues only managed two total shots the rest of the game. If I was speaking and not typing, it would have been hard to self-censor myself there.
The Blues had late chances. Robert Thomas had a shorthanded breakaway midway through the period and missed the entire net. Thomas also had a chance to setup Otto Stenberg for a shorthanded tying goal late, but they could not get a shot there either.
Perhaps as bad, if not worse, than Thomas' miss was an empty net that was not hit for the Blues. St. Louis pulled Joel Hofer and Buffalo almost had a gaffe with their goalie out of the net. Unfortunately, the Blues pass to the middle was too far in front of Snuggerud and he tried to one-time slapshot it and missed the net. Buffalo almost immediately put it into the Blues' empty net after that and won 4-2.
Con: The passing
Regardless of whether the team was ahead or behind, this may have been one of their worst passing performances the entire season. It is not hyperbole to say you could likely count on one hand the number of Blues passes that went tape to tape.
All game long, it was either in the skates or causing someone to reach. You have an empty net to shoot in to tie the game at the end and can't connect on a quality pass that would've set up the goal. That play was at least rushed.
The entire game there were passes just because nobody wanted to make a play. They crossed either blue line and just looked to give it to someone so they would do something and it was never a good idea, nor a good pass.
Power plays were ruined because the Blues can't get the puck back into the zone because they just blindly throw it backwards and nobody is there. Offensive zone time was limited because players along the halfwall would get onto their backhand and just chuck it somewhere, hoping a teammate would be there, but they were not because they had just left that spot.
This team struggles to score goals at the best of times, but when you're passing to skates or 2-3 feet away from someone, you can't even expect them to have a shot available because the pass screwed them over.
Pro: Hofer
I'll be the first to admit I'm a Jordan Binnington guy. I only say that because the team is forcing an unnecessary goaltender controversy, but the reality is it didn't matter who was in net in this game because the team sucked. Hofer didn't.
Hofer was the only guy that showed up. If not for him, Buffalo would've regained the lead in the second period and then ran away with it in the third.
There's no pride being shown by anyone in a Blues uniform that isn't wearing a mask. How many times does Hofer (or Binny) have to bail them out only for them to do nothing with that gift?
Hofer faced 33 shots and maybe he saves one of those goals on a different night. I'm not even saying it was a soft goal, but on a different night maybe he gets a blocker to the one. Other than that, he did his job and then some. You can't continually expect your goalies, even though they're good, to hold opponents to one goal.
Con: Regression
As the game went along, the Blues got worse. How that's possible, considering you allow the first goal and then battle back to take the lead is beyond me.
The second period starts oddly, having to kill off a full two minutes of a power play, but you do it. Instead of buckling down, things steadily go wrong the rest of the game.
The Buffalo goalie was not good at all, but instead of finding ways to test him, you only get seven shots in the second period and two in the third. That's pathetic. St. Louis had as many shots in the first period as they had the entire rest of the game and they weren't even that good in the first.
Individually, it was a mess. Dvorsky only had 10-ish minutes of ice time in the game and he was the third-line center. Jim Montgomery must've lost faith in that entire line because they all had the lowest amount of ice time of any forwards.
Mailloux and Fowler was a disaster combination. Mailloux was on the ice less than nine minutes, the fewest of any player, and had three goals go in. Whether you blame him or not, Fowler was out there for all four goals.
Kyrou is just returning from a knee injury, but he only had four shifts in the third period. Your best goal scorer can't even get in the game because the coach said he needs to move his skates more.
It's ridiculous. It makes no sense that all these players, and more, could get worse as the intensity of the game should make them better and also got worse just from the last game they played.
Overview:
I try not to get too high or low about any one game, but this team continually shows that there's something big missing. It's not talent. I don't care what anyone says - there's talent in there, but there's no focus to it.
They want everything to come easy, and I'm not just talking about the new/young guys. There's no "dawgs" out there.
You just pick up Jonatan Berggren off waivers and he plays well, which he should to earn a spot. However, he gets scratched because the coaching staff didn't think he was doing the things asked of him against Nashville.
You hope that Dvorsky will be a top-six forward for years to come in the future, but he barely played half the game because he's not doing things. Fabbri played pretty hard, but somewhat got punished due to the line he was with.
Fowler could not have turned into a bad defenseman overnight, especially after so many years with an awful Anaheim team and now coming to a team that had playoff aspirations. His play suggests otherwise.
What disheartens the fanbase about this team is that, whatever you want to say is missing - heart, effort, passion, etc - it is not there for the entire team. I'm talking from the captain right on down.
Schenn plays hard, but clearly he can't singlehandedly pull this team out. On a good team, he's a third line player at this stage of his career, so maybe his voice has been lost the way some coaches' voices get lost.
Nobody on this team is capable of grabbing the game by the scruff and taking it over. They won't even do that on one single play, let alone for a game. They all want to pass the puck off and hope the next guy will do it.
Defenders are lost because goals go in whether they follow their man or guard the space. They don't have a clue which way to go right now.
It is literally top to bottom that this team has failed, which means it's entirely mental. It seems statistically impossible for 18 skaters to all have bad games at a time, but the Blues pull it off.
The Blues still need to make the playoffs if possible, but the reality is they're only in the race because the bottom of the Western Conference is mediocre, not because the Blues are keeping themselves in it.