Follow me on twitter Follow @stlgoalie The Blues seem to be suffering from split personalities this season and its taking their fans on a roller coaster ride. The inconsistencies have been rampant this season whether it is their 67% winning percentage at home yet only 31.3% at home (forget the loser point for a second) or having the worst save percentage in the league but the 6th best shooting percentage. It goes further with the 2nd best penalty kill at home but the 21st best on the road and league best power play on the road but only 16th best at home.
Look no further than the last two games for more evidence. On Wednesday night, the Blues showed resilience coming back from 1st and 3rd period deficits to win the game 6-3, scoring four unanswered third period goals. Sure Blues fans would like to see the 85% save percentage in the game be better but you can’t fault Carter Hutton at all for the first two goals and he had little chance on the third goal. The goals continue to illustrate the defensive coverage and battle issues that the Blues are having this season whether it’s Carl Gunnarsson getting outworked in front of the net, Jay Bouwmeester making a poor defensive read and play on Wayne Simmonds or Paul Stastny being slow to cover on the back check. But the key in this game was that the team battled through it for the victory.
Compare and contrast that to last night against the Predators where Jake Allen stopped less than 79% of the shots he faced and Carter Hutton didn’t fare all that much better in relief at 89% but the save percentages don’t tell the whole story. Allen had no chance on the first two goals nor did Hutton on his only goal against.
Defensive coverage issues and lost battles were yet again more of the story. For examples, look to Ryan Reaves choice to throw a hit and leave his coverage, Bouwmeester’s screen of Allen, Bouwmeester getting walked by Arvidsson (an example of where him checking might help a lot), and all four penalty killers getting caught almost on the goal line while defending only three Predators.
Up today is the Blues vs Blackhawks Alumni game. I think this crowd will contain a lot more Blues fans than Monday’s game. I’m looking forward to attending with family and hope they enjoy the game. Taking them is just a small way for us to say thank you for all they have done for us over the years.
It’s a great day for hockey.
Fellow Hockeybuzz bloggers Nashville Predator's Paul McCann, Winnipeg Jet's Peter Tessier and Minnesota Wild's Dan Wallace have generously agreed to a friendly charity wager. We were hoping to do the whole division but don't have it fully represented yet. The blogger whose team finishes the highest the standings at the end of the year gets to pick a charity to whom the others donate in their name.