by It’s starting to sound like a broken record for the 2024-25 St. Louis Blues.
Consistency. Go for a run. Stay relevant in the Western Conference wild card race. They said all the right things – once again – after picking up back-to-back wins against the Calgary Flames last week. But once again the chance to make it three wins in a row is going by the wayside as an uninspiring start led to a 4-2 loss to the struggling Utah Hockey Club at the Delta Center on Saturday.
Tyler Tucker and Jake Neighbors scored for the Blues (22-21-4) and Jordan Binnington made 29 saves, but the second wild-card Blues fell three points behind the Flames, who beat the Winnipeg Jets 3-1 on Saturday won in the Western Conference.
Time to address the three takeaways:
* Another chance at a three-game winning streak, another missed opportunity – It’s amazing that this team is on a modest three-game winning streak after 47 games.
I say modest because he’s honest: three wins in a row isn’t that difficult. But the Blues remain the only team in the league to have failed to achieve this feat, astonishing as that is. They are now 0-7-1 in those situations.
The persistence of turning the dial up a play and then thinking they can wade through a play and try to steal one, knowing the opponent is desperate and won’t duck you, is why this team is out is and will remain Check in when all is said and done for the Western Conference playoffs.
Until the Blues can prove us wrong, this team will miss the playoffs for the third straight year. Tonight’s performance was the turning point.
* The first half lacked any urgency, the desperation was led by the Blues top line, which was (again) owned by the Utah top line – The Blues knew full well that Utah (19-19-7) had lost three straight and won one in its last six games (1-4-1). Oh, and Utah had the fewest home wins (six) in the NHL.
And even after a Tyler Tucker goal gave the Blues a 1-0 lead at the 2:05 mark, fourth-line forward Liam O’Brien tried to coax Tucker into a fight, throwing his stick as Tucker threw a punch fired by Connor Ingram caught a faceoff win over Oskar Sundqvist and then finally fought – and split open O’Brien’s head – three seconds later, the Blues no longer had a jump:
Christopher Creveling-Imagn Images
They looked confused and played. Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz, who have tormented the Blues throughout their respective careers, were back at it. For what felt like the millionth time, the Blues had a specific task: They wanted to neutralize Utah’s top line with Logan Cooley.
All that line accomplished was Robert Thomas, Pavel Buchnevich and Jake Neighbors scoring an out point total of 8-1 and 6-0 at even strength.
Michael Kesselring’s power play goal after Zack Bolduc unnecessarily stumbled 200 feet from his net tied the game at 1-1 at 6:06, but then came a tap-in goal from Schmaltz at 8:25 after Thomas scored Having lost puck on this attempt skating into the offensive zone, he then failed to defend the middle of the ice on a cross-seat pass to Keller, which allowed him to Finding Schmaltz for the tap-in, who wasn’t defended by Colton Parayko or Cam Fowler, so either:
And on Keller’s goal at 10:31, making it 3-1, Thomas and Neighbors were sent up with a cross to move the puck out of the zone, turning it over, resulting in a minor penalty. But Keller ended Cooley’s tryout after the young center from Utah was taken out:
And Montgomery set an example in that regard, benching the trio for the rest of the period until Neighbors took the ice in the final 13 seconds of a power play.
The Blues were defeated in the 17:6 phase and had to play catch-up hockey.
Knowing what it was about and the way Tucker set the tone early, this first period performance was nothing short of astounding.
* The team did nothing with three power play opportunities in the third period – The Blues made some good moves in the final 40 minutes. As previously mentioned, the Neighbors took advantage of a play by Dylan Holloway and Brayden Schenn to cut the deficit to 3-2 at 1:32 of the second period:
And that line in particular with Holloway, Schenn and Jordan Kyrou kept things going throughout the game, creating one scoring opportunity after another, and even though they were down two in the third period, the Blues created three power play opportunities.
There was longer zone time in each case, but out of six minutes with an extra man, the Blues only managed one shot on goal. But many missed goals.
There was a scene where Holloway and Kyrou almost scored, but Utah defenseman John Marino blocked what looked like a sure goal by Kyrou. That’s the kind of commitment the home team made in this game and one the Blues don’t seem interested in making.
Hear what Montgomery, Thomas and Buchnevich had to say after the game:
