St. Louis Blues Pros/Cons 2024-25 Game 1

The St. Louis Blues opened up the 2024-25 season in Seattle against the Kraken in an odd 3:30pm start time. Interestingly, it didn't initially seem to bother the team.

The Blues came out reasonably well in the first five minutes. They had some chances and had some jump. Jordan Kyrou rang one off the post on a shot that broadcasters initially thought may have gone in since it set off the goal light, but no such luck.

Unfortunately, the offense slowly disappeared. The Blues would be outshot 11-5 in the first period, continuing a worrying trend from the previous season where they didn't even approach double-digit shots.

Things got worse in the second period. The Blues looked sluggish and the Kraken were connecting on plays.

Seattle took the lead early in the second period. The Kraken came in on an odd-man rush and former Blues D-man, Vince Dunn, knocked in his own rebound to make it 1-0.

It wouldn't be long after that it was 2-0. This time a shot from the left point was deflected in front of the net, giving Jordan Binnington no chance.

It felt like the game was slipping away, but the game swung the other way when the game reached the halfway mark.

Fans' favorite punching bag, Kyrou, got the Blues on the board at nearly 14 minutes in. He scored on a backhand play with St. Louis on the power play to make it 2-1.

The Blues tied it less than two minutes later. Philip Broberg took the pass from the high slot and snapped a wister from the left circle to make it 2-2.

Then Kyrou got another to nab the lead. A soft, saucer pass found Kyrou on the break and he slipped one to the glove side for a 3-2 lead.

The Blues opened the third period with 99 seconds of power play time. That went by the wayside and then the Blues had to kill an interference call on Brayden Schenn not long after that.

The Blues offense was tepid at best in the third period, but they got the job done overall. Although the shot totals weren't what you might like in the third, at least you didn't feel like the Blues were totally just trying to pack it in.

It wasn't the best 60 minutes of all time, but the Blues got a win. Ideally, you'd get that empty net goal, but a 3-2 win will suffice.

Cons: Slow

For the first 30 minutes of the game it looked as though all the bluster about being faster and stronger was just that. The Blues looked slow, plain and simple.

The first period was ok, but the first half of the second was really bad. Seattle was knifing passes around the Blues like they were training pilons.

The Blues looked like they had cement in their skates while the Kraken were quick, on point and on their toes. St. Louis was probably fortunate the game was not out of hand since their offense was nowhere to be found, they couldn't even possess the puck and actually looked like they had downgraded their roster from 2023-24.

Con: Weak on the puck

Similar to the speed issue, another thing we were told was upgraded in the offseason was the tenacity on the puck. St. Louis got bigger and were supposed to be meaner.

Maybe that will be true over the course of the season, but we saw the same weak play in the first half of the game. Guys were just reaching after pucks and losing battles left and right.

The first goal happened because Colton Parayko, your number one defenseman, lost a stick battle approaching the left wall and then failed to take care of the puck or the man as he went for a weak hit to finish the play. That led to an odd-man rush.

He wasn't alone either. St. Louis was reaching a lot to begin the game. It didn't result in any penalties in this game, but we've seen over the last two years how many trips or interference calls.

Pro: Jordan Kyrou

I'm a Kyrou fan and not ashamed of it. However, even I've had to admit that he's a tough watch sometimes.

He visibly looks to give up on plays at times, speaking of last season. He can be weak on the puck and even for a scorer, he's streaky in a way that can be maddening.

However, in this game, he got the job done. He made some defensive plays, didn't really cough the puck up much and scored two goals.

They were both solid, goal-scorer's goals too. The first was just a decisive, hard drive to the net with a nice, backhander to finish. The second was a laser shot from in close, just how you want a scorer to end a breakaway.

Let's not get overly excited for how many goals Kyrou might have this season, but it's already a much better start to 2024-25 than the previous year.

Pro: Getting the win

As mentioned, this game wasn't a barnburner, but the Blues got the job done. They did what they needed to do and showed enough improvement in the areas they lacked last year.

The game wasn't overly physical, but the Blues had more hits than the Kraken. You could argue that shows they had the puck less, but you have to start somewhere.

St. Louis was a porous team in 2023-24. They did allow 32 shots, but blocked 18.

The Blues also won the faceoff battle. For a team that added depth pieces up the middle, this will be key all year. When the Blues got beat up on the scoreboard last season, they were often really bad from the faceoff dot in those games.

Overview

A win is a win, is a win. I wasn't all that impressed with the team as a whole for this contest, but they got two points and that's all that matters.

The first half of the game was very worrying. They were slow, lethargic and not at all engaged in the game the way they needed to be.

Jordan Binnington kept the team in the contest until they finally woke up. Ideally, Binner would not have allowed the rebound to Dunn in the first place, but outside of that, I didn't see too much to fault him on in this game.

The plus and the minus for the offense is they got three goals, but the entire offsense came in a two-minute span. There wasn't much of a push back in the third period, but at least the Blues didn't just try to defend wave after wave from the Kraken.

Overall, you take the two points and move on to San Jose. That's another winnable game, although the Blues struggled with the Sharks even though they're in full rebuild moode.

I expect much of the season to go like this game. You're going to get outplayed by mediocre teams at times and then have flashes of brilliance where you wonder why they can't sustain that.

The key will be to get move of the flashes. Time will tell, but you can't argue with a season-opening W.