THE NUMBERS
St. Louis Blues: 13-8-2 (28 points), 2nd in West
Los Angles Kings: 9-8-4 (22 points), 6th in West
THE SERIES SO FAR
Jan. 23: Blues 4, Kings 2
Torey Krug scored his first goal as a Blue to open the scoring, and Vince Dunn, David Perron and Jaden Schwartz also scored to lift the Blues to a 4-2 win at Enterprise Center.
Jan. 24: Kings 6, Blues 3
Anze Kopitar had a goal and two assists in a 6-3 win for the Kings at Enterprise Center. It was the Kings first road win of the season. Brayden Schenn scored two goals, Jordan Kyrou had two assists and Ville Husso made 29 saves in his first NHL start.
Feb. 22: Kings 3, Blues 0
Jonathan Quick made 31 saves to record his second shutout in three starts in a 3-0 win against the Blues at Enterprise Center. The victory was Los Angeles' fifth straight. The Blues fell to 1-4-1 in their last six home games and were shutout for the third time this season.
Feb. 24: Kings 2, Blues 1
Oskar Sundqvist ended a Blues' goal-less streak of 139 minutes and 33 seconds when he scored with 1:46 left in regulation, but the Blues still fell 2-1 to the Kings at Enterprise Center. The win was LA's sixth straight, tying them with the Tampa Bay Lightning for the longest win streak of the season at the time.
BLUE NOTES
The Blues have won three straight games on the West Coast trip, which continues Friday with two games against the Kings and one more against the San Jose Sharks on Monday… The Blues have won four of their last five games in LA, outscoring the Kings 21-8 in that stretch… David Perron leads the Blues with 26 points in 41 career games against the Kings… Zach Sanford has six points (four goals, two assists) in a three-game point streak… The Blues have lost 101 man games to injury this season.
BOTTOM LINE: St. Louis heads into a matchup against Los Angeles as winners of three consecutive games.
The Kings are 9-8-4 against the rest of their division. Los Angeles has given up 11 power-play goals, killing 83.6% of opponent chances.
The Blues are 13-8-2 against the rest of their division. St. Louis has scored 74 goals and ranks eighth in the Nhl averaging 3.2 goals per game. Brayden Schenn leads the team with 11.
In their last matchup on Feb. 24, Los Angeles won 2-1.
TOP PERFORMERS: Dustin Brown leads the Kings with 11 goals, adding six assists and recording 17 points. Drew Doughty has three goals over the last 10 games for Los Angeles.
Justin Faulk leads the Blues with a plus-15 in 23 games this season. David Perron has two goals and eight assists over the last 10 games for St. Louis.
LAST 10 GAMES: Kings: 6-2-2, averaging three goals, 4.7 assists, 2.9 penalties and 5.8 penalty minutes while giving up two goals per game with a .935 save percentage.
Blues: 6-4-0, averaging 3.2 goals, 5.5 assists, 2.7 penalties and 5.6 penalty minutes while giving up 2.9 goals per game with a .900 save percentage.
INJURIES: Kings: Jaret Anderson-Dolan: out (upper body).
Blues: Colton Parayko: day to day (upper body), Carl Gunnarsson: out for season (lower body), Jaden Schwartz: day to day (upper body), Robert Thomas: out (thumb), Barbashev (out), De La Rose (out), Tarasenko (out), Bozak (out)
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I have no idea how ESPN decides to list injured players. Gunnarson is on LTIR, but the other 4 players on it aren't listed. De La Rose is on IR and not even listed either. It makes zero sense how whatever bot they are using to generate articles decides which players to list, which is why they last 4 are in italics - the ones ESPN skipped listing. Only one I'm not counting is Steen since he "retired", but hasn't "retired."
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The Blues are buzzing in this game. They seem to have their energy back after the last several being listless against The Sharks, and a little tired against The Ducks. Let's hope they don't tire late in this game.
Good 1st Period by The Blues. They had a lot of energy, good, spirited forecheck, getting back well on defence, attacking the puck in The Neutral Zone, taking the puck away, and making it tough for The Kings to get the puck into The Blues' zone, winning races to the puck, using the body fairly well, and Husso is really into the game. I hope they keep this up all 3 periods.
It seems that for this period, The Kings have made adjustments against The Blues heavy forecheck, and so The Blues are having trouble getting and keeping possession in The Kings' Zone, and as a result, are having a harder time developing any offence.
By far Husso's best game this season. Let's see him keep that up whenever he plays again, since Binner will be in net for the next one.
The Kings are the best of the bottom 4 and are close to being a playoff team again with the way they are playing and the talent that's coming up in their system. Good to see the Blues beat them. With the Blues playing the Wild, Avs and G. Knights so much in the last 20, (17 of the last 20), it could give the Kings a chance to slide into the 4th place spot if the Blues win more of those than they lose.
And I hope to heck Sundqvist isn't out long term. He's one of those guys whose a great 3rd/4th line guy who can play up in the top 6 and be effective when necessary. Those kinds of players who can play up and down in the lineup and be effective in whichever role the coach asks of them are glue guys who are very difficult to replace. With all of the current injuries, missing Sundqvist right now is likely a bigger issue than it would normally be. Of course, if Tank plays tonight, it helps Berube since he won't have to decide which guy to sit with the Blues on a winning streak.
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