3 players who must step up for the St. Louis Blues last stand to make the NHL Playoffs
Colton Parayko must bump up the intensity even more
Colton Parayko is the one player on this list who doesn’t necessarily need to bring an aspect of his game back up to par. He’s been a force all season on the blue line, and the towering defenseman’s physical play has resulted in 200-plus blocked shots this season and, once again, triple digits in the hits column.
But Parayko’s ability to continually disrupt, be it with a body check or stealing the puck, is something that he must turn up one more notch as the season winds down. Hey, 68 takeaways in his first 75 games are sensational, but get it up to one per game while getting a stick on the puck to disrupt opponents every time they enter the Blues zone.
Parayko has been a force defensively, and he’s also capable of pitching in a bit more in the offensive zone. We’ve seen him find the net 10 times, which ties a career-high. If he can keep throwing pucks at the net, there is a 100 percent chance you will see more life from the Blues offensively.
If Buchnevich, Thomas, and Parayko all bring a little more urgency over these last two weeks of the season, then the Blues chances of surpassing the Kings just grew tenfold, even if the latter need to lose quite a few games at this point.
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(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference)