The St. Louis Blues gave us a little confidence with some healthy bodies and a last-second win over the Florida Panthers. With the Columbus Blue Jackets riding high on a coaching-change run, it was impossible to know what to expect.
The Blues got off to a good start. They had an early six shots compared to only two or three for the Blue Jackets. The Blues' main problem was that they weren't shooting high enough against a goalie who is more susceptible to high shots.
The Blues did get the first goal of the game. They sprang Jimmy Snuggerud on a break, and he left little doubt to make it 1-0, 7:11 into the period.
Unfortunately, it unraveled after that. Columbus tied the game when a routine pass went off Robby Fabbri's skate right to a Columbus player, and they hit the backdoor pass to even it up 37 seconds later.
About five minutes after that, the Blues continued to knock pucks into their own net. Colton Parayko got a deflection on a Blue Jackets shot that gave Jordan Binnington no chance to react, and it was 2-1.
The Blues did tie it up in the second period. With St. Louis on the power play, a point shot was blocked, but after it pinballed around a few times, it came to Jonatan Berggren on the right hash, and he roofed it for a 2-2 game.
Five minutes after that goal, it was Columbus ahead again as the Blues' penalty kill continues to be horrendous. Nobody had a body on the man in front of the net, and it was an easy deflection in front of Binnington that gave him no chance again and made it 3-2 with 11:30 left.
St. Louis did manage to tie the game. Tyler Tucker just flung one from the left boards towards the net, and it found its way off the post and in to make it 3-3 at 13:35.
Binnington continued to have some struggles in the 2025-26 season as Columbus retook the lead at 16:01. A slap shot from the blue line had steam, but there was no deflection, and it beat Binnington past the blocker. He may have seen it late, but that's just a shot we're not used to seeing go in.
The Blues got a power play around seven minutes in. As usual, they had trouble even keeping the puck in the zone and only got two shots, none of which were very dangerous.
Snuggerud earned another Blues power play about five minutes later. Jim Montgomery tried the second unit, which was the one that scored the goal, but they had even more of an issue even holding the puck.
The ending went about as well as you could expect. Despite the fact that the Blues outshot Columbus 15-4, the Blue Jackets were only trying to hold on, and St. Louis couldn't do anything. Then they crapped their pants, even trying to pull the goalie, as Binnington couldn't get off until close to just a minute left. Jordan Kyrou had a weak shot that was easily blocked, and the spring out of the zone led to an empty net goal and a 5-3 win for Columbus.
Con: Penalty kill
Special teams have been an issue all year, but the penalty kill has fallen off a cliff over the last few weeks. Not only are they allowing goals, but it's almost immediately after the opponent's power play begins.
The Blues have allowed at least two power-play goals in a game for the last four, and who knows how many overall. We've tried to give them credit since they did kill off that double-minor against the Panthers in crunch time, but some of these games might not even get to crunch time if they could just kill off these other penalties.
Con: Stats don't add up
If you look at the box score, this is a confusing game. The Blues won several of the key battles, and yet not on the scoresheet.
The Blues had more shots, including the 15-4 shot stat in the third period alone. While not by a large margin, St. Louis won the faceoff battle.
The power play wasn't great, but you still get at least one power play goal, and 1-4 isn't a terrible stat line. You had a decent amount of blocks and hits, but it led to nothing.
Pro: Snuggerud
I'm trying not to be too excited about this guy just because I, personally, have been burned. It seems like as soon as I get attached to a player, they start a downward trend.
For example, Binnington and Kyrou are two of my favorite players right now. They're still not nearly as bad as anyone online says, but they're not living up to expectations right now either.
Even with that in mind, it is hard not to be excited about Snuggerud. We got a small glimpse last year and, even though there's been some ups and downs, he's showing plenty of promise this season too.
He's got some slick moves and a sniping ability. The reason he could end up being a better scorer than Kyrou is that Snuggerud has more of a shooter's mentality, whereas Kyrou tends a bit too much towards playmaker.
Snuggerud gave this team every chance to win. He got a goal and an assist and was firing away late, too.
Overview:
This game is a prime example of why I didn't want to get too hyped after beating the Panthers. This team lures you in with the idea that they're getting healthy, and guys have spent some weeks competing for spots, and they could find a groove.
Instead, they just skate themselves headfirst into the wall. The power play is just atrocious, even though they did get a goal.
At this stage, it's just a player problem, not even a system. The passes are bad, the decision-making is bad, and guys are fumbling pucks on simple plays, which only emboldens each and every penalty kill you face.
While I don't blame Binnington, he's just not having a good time right now. There are so many shots being deflected that he has no chance on that; it's affecting his mental game, and then he ends up with an iffy goal at times when he normally would've made that big save that made the difference.
Overall, it just wasn't good enough from the Blues. I just can't understand what's in their subconscious when they understand how they've played when they win.
When they win, there are too many times when they don't want to battle. Even Monty said in his post-game conference that he thought the Blues wanted the game to be easy in the first couple of periods.
You can't go balls to the wall, 2019 playoff style hockey for 82 nights a year, but the fact that we keep saying there's a lack of effort or attack or will or want things to be easy just isn't right. You're getting paid millions of dollars to go to work, and you should give your best every time out.
A plumber can't go to a job and say, well it wasn't as easy a job as he'd hoped, so just kind of went through the motions. I'm sure that does happen, but their livelihood will be affected eventually, and this team isn't in a spot where they can bench anyone.
For a long time, this team has looked like they were just trying to get to the Olympic break. If injuries were the only issue, that would be alright, but even when healthy, there's just been something lacking all season, and that's what we saw against Columbus - it was a winnable game, and there was just something lacking.