Follow @stlgoalie I didn’t get to see last night’s game but by all accounts the Blue Jackets handed it to the Blues. Let’s take a review of some of the goals last night.
While some may say the first goal of the game, a backhand from Sam Gagner, wasn’t a good goal for Jake Allen to give up, I think it is more illustrative of how the Blues defensive coverage has been very poor this season. Jay Bouwmeester leaves his man, puck chasing which allows Gagner to walk out, uncontested. See it illustrated in the below frames.
Alex Pietrangelo and Bouwmeester both appear to have players covered here:
Bouwmeester then decides to leave his man and engage Petro’s as you can see here (also note how neither Kyle Brodziak nor Scottie Upshall has the player in the slot covered:
Later, only 8 seconds after the Blues tied the game on a Kevin Shattenkirk power play goal, the Blue Jackets regained the lead due to a poor pass at the defensive Blue line by Pietrangelo and Jake Allen getting beat from a wide angle. Pietrangelo telegraphed his pass and Foligno took it and then got the puck back and beat Allen on a shot he has to save. Not only is this a stop he needs to stop but it is a shot he has to stop at this particular point of the game. You can’t allow the lead to go back to them on a weak goal.
The Blue Jackets would make it 3-1 before the end of the period on yet another poor play by Pietrangelo. Instead of letting the rather harmless shot from the point go, Pietrangelo tries to stop it with his stick and deflects it between Allen’s legs. Nothing Allen could do on this goal.
The Blue Jackets open the scoring in the second period to make it 4-1 on another play illustrative of poor defensive zone coverage. This time Brodziak gets caught watching the play in the corner instead of marking his man who has come off the half wall. This allows the pass to get through to Gagner for the goal. Allen also misplays this goal, not getting the low puck and taking himself down and out of any real potential save. At this point, poor goaltending and defensive coverage has been responsible for all four Blue Jackets goals.
Less than 40 seconds later, the Blue Jackets make it 5-1 on a four on a three break. On the goal Brandon Dubinsky gets a far post tap-in for his first goal of the year. Carter Hutton had no chance on the goal.
About five minutes later the Blue Jackets made it 6-1 as Pietrangelo is late to cover the slot, allowing Nutivaara to get the goal from the slot, his first NHL goal.
Less than 3 minutes later the Blue Jackets would get their 6th unanswered goal to make it 7-1 as William Karlsson scores from above the right circle. Hutton shows his frustration after the goal, gesturing with his trapper. While there was a bit of traffic to his right, this seemed like a stoppable shot.
The Blues then got power play goals from Robby Fabbri and Vladimir Tarasenko before Zach Werenski would add a power play goal, the Blue Jackets 8th goal. Fabbri finished the scoring with his second power play goal, making the game 8-4.
Perhaps some of you may think my criticism of Pietrangelo above is harsh. If so, I might point out that the coaching staff only gave him 19:19 in ice time. This was his lowest of the year by almost 2 minutes and more than 6 minutes under his season average. By all accounts, he wasn’t the only one who struggled as Nail Yakupov, Brodziak, and Upshall played around 23 minutes combined and were -9 combined. Of course Bouwmeester and Pietrangelo were also -9, meaning one line was a combined -18. Ouch.
The few highlights seemed to be Fabbri’s 2 goals, Perron’s 3 assists and Tarasenko’s four points while all only being -1, the team going 4 of 5 on the power play, and Shattenkirk and Carl Gunnarsson being the only Blues players not on the ice for an even strength goal against.
I realize that Blues fans may focus on the idea that on many nights the Blues goalies very well could have stopped half of the Blue Jackets goals. I would suggest that they should focus on the quality of chances the team is giving up and how that is concerning. As you would expect, pairing coverage miscues with below average goaltending is a recipe for losing.
Is this a situation of inconsistent or confusing message? Is this a situation a result of the learning curve and struggles of implementing new coaches and some new philosophies? It is a result of players trying to adjust to new roles with key players gone? Regardless of the cause, it is going to be a frustrating season for Blues fans until it gets addressed.
Interesting side note, of the 4 goalies the Blues could have had this season, Anders Nilsson is performing the best with a 94.2% save percentage vs Hutton (90.0%), Allen (89.6%) and Elliott (88.2%).
Next up for the Blues will be Buffalo on Tuesday.
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.\