ST.
LOUIS – Seriously, who really saw this coming?
From
this St. Louis Blues team that was the last in the NHL this season to
win three games in a row, let alone 10, after finding a way to win in
a different fashion on Tuesday against the Detroit Red Wings.
When
Cam Fowler scored at 3:27 of overtime to cap a last-minute comeback,
staring at the clutches of defeat for the first time in 19 days,
before rallying past the Red Wings 2-1, it gave the Blues (41-28-7)
their 10th
straight win.
Consider
this: the Blues, who by the way are now one point ahead of the
Minnesota Wild – who have a game in hand – for the first wild
card in the Western Conference, were the last team in the NHL this
season to put together a three-game winning streak, and it took
nine(!) tries to do that, now are the hottest team in the NHL; they
are one win shy of matching the franchise record for consecutive wins
at 11 (accomplished by the 2019 Stanley Cup champion side) and one
win from matching the Winnipeg Jets for longest winning streak in the
league this season.
How
is this happening?
There
is some serious mojo going on around here considering the fact the
Blues were 29 seconds away from being blanked by Cam Talbot, the same
Cam Talbot who was offered up as a sacrificial lamb in this very
building when the Blues downed the Wild in the first round of the
playoffs just three years ago.
But
Jordan Kyrou help steal a valuable point with a sixth-attacker goal
set up by none other than Fowler, and then Fowler won it in OT.
“It’s
been a fun ride here,” Fowler said. “We’ve all enjoyed playing
with one another. There’s not many opportunities you have in this
league to keep a streak like this going. It was one of those games
where they did a good job of limiting our chances and we just had to
stay as patient as we possibly could.
“We’ve
kept faith for a long time now knowing that we can win hockey games
no matter how much time is left. Our guys just stuck with it and
everybody made some big-time plays that helped us win. It’s fun to
be able to keep this thing rolling.”
Jordan
Binnington, named the NHL's third star of the month for March, made 20 saves, some of them key stops.
“I
don’t know if mental toughness is the right word, but the way we
stick to it,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said. ‘We said we need
to simplify in the third, we thought our second was too much
east-west, too many turnovers, not winning enough battles. We just
had to get back to our identity and who we are. I felt we did as good
a job as we could. We didn’t have much juice in the legs tonight
and for whatever reasons, that just happens. First time we’ve had
two days off in a while and maybe we didn’t handle that the right
way. We’ll take another day off tomorrow and we’ll get back at it
Thursday.”
It
was a triumphant win and debut for 2022 first-round pick (No. 23
overall) Jimmy Snuggerud, who joined the Blues after signing his
three-year, entry-level contract on Friday.
How
about those Three Takeaways:
*
Montgomery’s early goalie pull – It was only 1-0, and there was
3:23 remaining in regulation, but Montgomery felt it was the right
time to lift Binnington.
The
Blues had allowed the Red Wings (34-33-7) to forge ahead when J.T.
Compher broke the scoreless stalemate at 5:13 of the third period and
they just didn’t seem like they were going to have that
overwhelming push to level the game or take a lead.
Montgomery
saw some flaws that perhaps could be exposed and decided to go with
an extra body on the ice that finally paid off when Fowler was able
to slide down a seam play to Kyrou, who didn’t get all of his quick
shot but enough to slide it through the seemingly impenetrable
Talbot.
“We’re
just trying to attack there,” Kyrou said. “Not much time on the
clock and we get a recovery there. Obviously [Flower] made a helluva
pass to me right to the seam there and I just tried to tip it.”
Fowler
added, “We had some opportunities from probably the three-minute
mark. And we had a lot of possession down there, so I think they were
just keeping us to the outside. We were getting a couple good looks,
but for the most part, 6-on-5 you have to find a way to get pucks to
the net and to the dirty areas. That’s where the goals are scored.
I just saw a little seam to ‘Rouzy’ there and he made a great tip
to get us the goal to tie it up. It’s more just about trying to
funnel pucks to the front of the net 6-on-5, create as much chaos as
much as you can.”
But
credit Montgomery, who wasn’t seeing the kind of attack he wanted
at 5-on-5.
“No,
that’s why we pulled the goalie so early,” he said. “We weren’t
creating enough chances, we didn’t have enough zone time and they
were icing pucks because they were tired.
“I
felt that our first period was a pretty good period, but it wasn’t
hard enough offensively, and I just felt like we kind of lost energy
as the game went along. But the great thing is we found a way to win.
Our
third period continues to be a period where we play simple, our
habits are at their best and our game management was the best.
“They
iced the puck. They were tired. All the guys that we used were fresh
on the bench, so we didn’t have to use our time out and they were
fresh. We thought it was a good time to try and get a goal. You don’t
know if you’re going to get another offensive zone face-off.”
*
Sticking with it when not at their best – During this winning
streak, one aspect of the Blues’ game that couldn’t be faulted is
their cleanliness of puck movement.
They
had been swift, fluent, hitting guys in stride and not becoming
terribly vulnerable with puck turnovers.
Tonight
was one of those rare instances. But they stuck with it and found a
way.
“It
wasn’t sharp,” Montgomery said. ‘And I think it’s because of
our brains. Our brains were slower today to make reads, checking and
making plays offensively. We had a lot of odd-man rushes in the first
30 minutes and we didn’t get any real good scoring opportunities
like we did on the 2-on-1 and the overtime winner.”
It
all goes into play when putting together such a winning streak as
this, the good and the not-so-great.
“Very
hard. That’s an opportunity that doesn’t come around very often,”
Fowler said. “We understand that and how special it is. It takes a
lot of things to go right for that to be able to come true. I think
it just speaks to our lineup top to bottom, the work that we’ve
been putting in and we’ve had some comebacks here too in this
streak. We’re finding ways to win hockey games and it’s a lot of
fun coming to work and playing for one another. It’s a really tight
group and we certainly enjoy going out and working for one another.”
*
Fowler’s deft hands to win it – Once the Blues got it to
overtime, they have an edge. They have the ability to utilize
multiple bodies and Fowler was one of them.
The
defenseman jumped into the play when Robert Thomas checked Red Wings
defenseman Moritz Seider off the puck in the defensive zone and
created a 2-on-1. Once Thomas sauced a backhand towards Fowler, he
had to use his hands to, first, corral a puck and pull it into
stride, and two, be deft enough to lift it into the top end of the
net to win it.
“A
quick little 2-on-1 there,” Fowler said. “Obviously ‘Tommer’s
a great passer. He put me in a good position and I just saw myself in
with a good chance on the goalie and tried to make a good shot. It
was a good all-around play mostly by ‘Tommer.’ He set the whole
thing up.
“I
think that’s the strength of our team, the depth that we have up
front and on the back end. We feel like every night, there could be
different guys contributing and helping us win hockey games. I think
that’s totally true. We have a lot of weapons that we feel can help
us in overtime, helps us stay fresh and energized as well.”
As
for who was going over the boards next?
“We
feel we have a lot of players. I think if we were going to make
another change, it was going to be [Jake] Neighbours and Snuggerud
going over,” Montgomery said. ‘It would mean I was going to use
eight forwards and three D-men in the course of the 3-on-3 and that
speaks to the depth of talented players that we have.”
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