TEAM SNAPSHOTS
BLUES The St. Louis Blues will play their third consecutive home game Thursday night and are looking to grab a win at home after back-to-back losses at Enterprise Center.
A third-period rally against Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers on Sunday night wasn't quite enough. Trailing 4-2, the Blues roared back with goals from Ivan Barbashev and Vladimir Tarasenko early in the period, but the game was decided with 28 seconds when Edmonton's Kailer Yamamoto scored.
On Tuesday, the Blues fell again, this time to the struggling Arizona Coyotes. Jordan Kyrou and Torey Krug scored for the Blues in a 3-2 loss. This marked the third consecutive loss decided in the third period as the Coyotes took the lead with under seven minutes remaining.
"We have to be better. Every guy in the room knows (that)," said Blues captain Ryan O'Reilly. "It was a chance to win a hockey game and get back on track... We'll be better. There's a lot of hockey left."
Tuesday night saw a lot of roster change for the Blues, as they welcomed back Oskar Sundqvist after missing eight months due to ACL surgery; and Torey Krug, who missed five games in COVID-19 protocols. The team also welcomed defenseman Scott Perunovich, who made his NHL debut vs. Arizona and had 18:26 of total ice time.
The Blues enter the matchup with San Jose with a record of 8-5-2, good for 18 points and fourth place in the Central Division as of Wednesday afternoon.
SHARKS The San Jose Sharks are coming off a 4-1 win against the Minnesota Wild on Tuesday night. Tomas Hertl scored his team-leading seventh goal of the season to seal the victory in the third period.
Goaltender James Reimer made 26 saves for the Sharks, who had previously dropped two in a row and four of their last five.
"That was one of our better road games of the year," San Jose Head Coach Bob Boughner commented after the game. "We talked about getting back to what makes us successful, our identity and grinding out wins. It was a complete team win."
Thursday night will mark the end of a five game road trip in which the Sharks are 2-2-0. The other win came against Calgary, with the losses taking place in Winnipeg and Colorado.
The Sharks now sit at 8-6-1, worth 17 points and sixth place in the Pacific Division as of Wednesday afternoon.
HEAD-TO-HEAD The Blues won the only matchup between the two this season, a 5-3 game at SAP Center in San Jose on Nov. 4. Brandon Saad scored two goals and Joel Hofer won his first career game between the pipes.
Early penalties kicked things off for the Blues at San Jose, with overlapping penalty time from Pavel Buchnevich, Vladimir Tarasenko and Ivan Barbashev in the first half of the first period. This led to a 2-1 deficit after the first, which the Blues ultimately overcame with a three-goal second and an empty-netter in the third to seal the win.
Last season, the Blues were 5-1-2 against the Sharks and have now won three in a row against them, last losing on March 8 in overtime.
PLAYERS TO WATCH
BLUES Justin Faulk will suit up for his 700th career NHL game Thursday night, and he currently sits at 99 career goals.
SHARKS Timo Meier is beginning one of the best seasons of his career. The 25-year-old forward has 14 points entering Thursday's matchup, and posted a goal and an assist in the win at Minnesota.
BLUE NOTES
Dating back to March 27, 2018, the Blues are 10-2-3 in their last 15 regular-season games vs. San Jose... Eight of the last nine matchups have been decided by one goal, excluding empty-net goals (one OT game, two shootouts)... Torey Krug has 15 points (three goals, 12 assists) and a plus-11 rating in 21 regular-season games vs. the Sharks.
The slumping St. Louis Blues will try to snap their four-game winless streak when they host the San Jose Sharks Thursday night.
The Blues are coming off a 3-2 home-ice loss to the Arizona Coyotes, who had not won a road game all year.
"There was just not a lot of energy or life the first two periods," Blues coach Craig Berube said. "So that was the choice they made. Third period we had a ton more and controlled most of the period. But you can't go out and just not play -- you'll lose to any team in this league if you don't show up and (play) with any desperation or urgency in the game."
Since starting the season 5-0-0, the Blues have gone 3-5-2 in their last 10 games to sink in the Central Division standings. So they will seek a turning point while closing their three-game homestand against the Sharks at Enterprise Center.
"We've got to stop this before it gets out of hand, and we will," said defenseman Torey Krug, who just returned from his COVID-19 hiatus. "That's the resilience of this group. A big game on Thursday."
The Sharks lost four of five games before getting back on track with a 4-1 road victory over the Minnesota Wild.
"That was one of our better road games of the year," Sharks coach Bob Boughner said. "We talked about getting back to what makes us successful, our identity and grinding out wins. It was a complete team win. I thought every line gave us something tonight; I thought all the D that played were excellent, and had good goaltending. We came out ready to play a solid road game."
Since returning from COVID-19 protocols, Sharks winger Timo Meier has a goal and two assists in two games. He has 14 points in 10 games this season after producing just 31 points 54 games last season.
"I think he's finally bought in that the better he plays defensively, the less he's going to be in his own end," Boughner said. "He's been doing some great things in the offensive zone that he wasn't doing last year. He's getting to the point in his career where he understands the way he has to play to have success. This is the best hockey I've seen him play."
The Blues have gotten closer to full strength with the return of Krug and Oskar Sundqvist to active duty. Sundqvist had spent the last eight months recovering from knee surgery. Forward Brayden Schenn remains sidelined with an upper-body injury.
The team also promoted top defensive prospect Scott Perunovich from Springfield of the AHL after he scored 20 points in 12 games. He replaced Jake Walman in the starting lineup. Defenseman Niko Mikkola returned from COVID-19 protocol, but he has been a healthy scratch.
The Sharks have continued to shuffle their defensive corps. On Tuesday, Radim Simek was a healthy scratch for the first time this season with Santeri Hatakka replacing him in the lineup.
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The roster, right now, is how I thought the season would start with the Blues carrying 8 D due to Perunovich being so good, until they figured out what to do with Walman or Mikkola. The issue with this, if the Blues lose any forward for Covid or a non-long term injury, they are screwed cap-wise calling up a replacement this time, unless they try a) to get Walman or Mikkola through waivers or b) send Perunovich back. This is the Blues cap space - $76,575. I could honestly see the Blues sending Perunovich back if they lose a forward before Schenn returns, unless they are willing to play the 11 F, 7 D roster, which might be where they would go if it isn't a more than 4 games, less than 10 games kind of injury.
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As the St. Louis Blues look to snap a four-game winless streak (0-3-1), Head Coach Craig Berube appears to be shaking everything up.
The team held an optional practice before Thursday's 7 p.m. matchup with the San Jose Sharks (BSMW, 101 ESPN), but Berube had significantly revised forward lines and defense pairs on the ice for a full practice on Wednesday morning at Enterprise Center.
Ryan O'Reilly and David Perron were reunited on the top line with Jordan Kyrou on their left side, Pavel Buchnevich was skating with Robert Thomas and Vladimir Tarasenko, and a completely new line of Brandon Saad, Oskar Sundqvist and Ivan Barbashev was concocted.
"I was thinking about things, and I wanted to put an identity line together," Berube said of Saad-Sundqvist-Barbashev. "To me, that's an identity line, a line that is going to do the right thing, forecheck hard, play hard, be physical, hard on the other team, (can) play against anybody. I thought they were good in practice today, too."
Defensively, Berube had rookie Scott Perunovich skating with Justin Faulk. Both players played their college hockey at the University of Minnesota Duluth, and Faulk has allowed Perunovich to move into his home while the former Hobey Baker winner tries to make his mark with the Blues.
"I think it just makes it a little easier on him while he's trying to get his bearing here," Faulk said. "We all went through being a young guy in a new situations, having to get your bearings... I just wanted to make it easier on him."
Torey Krug joined Colton Parayko on the top pairing, while Marco Scandella moved to the third pairing with Robert Bortuzzo.
Ville Husso is expected to start in goal, making his first start since returning from COVID-19 protocols.
Below is a projected lineup based on Wednesday's practice. If changes are available at warm-ups, those will be updated here.
The identity line - putting Saad on it - the players all have the same numbers as the line from the Cup that was so darn good defensively - 20-70-49.
With this being the 7th game Schenn has missed, I'm surprised he isn't on LTIR. If a player is going to miss 10 games minimum, he's LTIR eligible. Playing Sat/Mon/Wed - that's 10 games. Unless they are confident he'll be back for any one of those 3 games.
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Timo Meier -- Logan Couture -- Jonathan Dahlen
Alexander Barabanov -- Tomas Hertl -- Rudolfs Balcers
Andrew Cogliano -- Nick Bonino -- Matt Nieto
Jonah Gadjovich -- Jasper Weatherby -- Kevin Labanc
Mario Ferraro -- Brent Burns
Erik Karlsson -- Jacob Middleton
Marc-Edouard Vlasic -- Santeri Hatakka
James Reimer
Scratched: Radim Simek, Nick Merkley
Injured: Nikolai Knyzhov (upper body), Lane Pederson (lower body), Jeffrey Viel (finger)
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While that was a better period for the most part, Tarasenko needs to make some better decisions with the puck, regardless of how good he's been lately. When the D is up near the blueline, trying to force a pass across, instead of chipping and chasing, almost always results in a turnover. 18 and 91 need to start doing this sometimes, because the Sharks flat out aren't backing in when those two are on the ice and are vulnerable if that line would do it. Controlled entries aren't always the best entries. Long, soft cross ice passes from inside your own blue line when you have an easy out to a forward on the boards on the same side of the ice with no defenders anywhere near that forward?? Come on, man. That one line (89-18-91) needs to start making better decisions, instead of trying to force home run plays and controlled entries when defenders are waiting for those types of plays. Two of that lines best chances came off of dump ins from center ice from Blues defenseman when that line was on the ice. They have the speed to force plays down low and need to use it more.
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Even strength in this one - note how many opportunities are being generated with passes from below or right near the goal line. Both Thomas' goal and Meier's goal were off of passes from near or below the goal line. Turn the defense so their backs are to the blueline and the offense has the advantage.
Of course, there is the exception of if you can get the puck to the fastest player on the ice, a good chance will happen as it did on Saad's goal from Sundqvist and Barbashev.
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Excellently played game. Miles better than Tuesday.
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Great game by Husso. Didn't have much work in the 3rd, but he was spot on when the Blues broke down in the 1st 2 periods. 2 games played, 1 GA, .984 SV% Contract year for Husso...
Ice in the Blues end must have been really bad in the last 5 minutes given how many players were fumbling pucks and it looked like the puck was sticking to the ice.
No penalties against the Blues. Only gave up 6 shots in the 3rd and 8 in the 2nd. Very disciplined game.
Nice win!!
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