“God was it an anxious moment on the bench”, Hitchcock said. “It was for me when we were there, when we felt like we put in so much effort and didn’t get much out of it”. TH2N breaks down their resilient win and discuss if Chicago’s lack of defensive depth finally caught up with them. Hitchcock, maybe captain David Backes, some other veterans, all were likely to be shown the door here had the Blues lost. – Ken HitchcockLet’s celebrate, St. Louis!
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“Ugliest goal I’ve ever scored, but the most timely”. He skated miles with the puck on his stick in an attempt to keep his team alive in this Game 7. “You’ve got to win four series against four tough opponents and we had the toughest matchup you could face in the first round, but that’s the draw”.
It’s early in the playoffs, but there’s reason for exuberance after they eliminated the defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks in Game 7 of their first-round Western Conference series Monday night. Instead, they were left to lament the little things that went wrong – like so many teams have done after losing to the Hawks in the last seven seasons.
It was fitting, then, that Coldplay’s “Fix You” blared on the sound system as the Blues and Blackhawks shook hands. In the playoffs, rookie-of-the-year candidate Artemi Panarin couldn’t find any space against the suffocating Blues’ defence.
That year, the Blackhawks went on to win it all.
The big struggles came in Games 3 and 4 in Chicago, where the Blackhawks gave up four power play tallies to the Blues. The Blues made this abundantly clear with their incredibly aggressive play right from the first puck drop. Star players nearing 30 years of age get massive raises for what they did, yet their production during the pricey new contract will be lower.
Parayko’s powerful point shot, which has been compared to the mighty blasts by Al MacInnis, a Hall of Famer and the Blues’ vice-president of hockey operations, also lit the lamp on the power play in game three, as the Blues grabbed a 2-1 series lead with the 3-2 decision in Chicago.
Though it remains to be seen whether the Blackhawks might encourage their fans to cheer on the Blues in the next round like the Kings did for the Capitals, the mutual respect between the two teams after seven intense games of hockey was noticed by fans. Patrick Kane was unsafe all night but was scoreless, and was minus-3.
Nashville Predators center Paul Gaustad (28) loses his helmet as he battles Anaheim Ducks defenseman Hampus Lindholm (47), of Sweden, for the puck in the first period of Game 6 in an NHL hockey first-round Stanley Cup playoff series Monday, April 25, 2016, in Nashville, Tenn.
For the Blues, and particularly GM Doug Armstrong, Tuesday marked validation. “It’s just a disappointing, weird feeling right now”.
I know it’s just one round. They’ve coached together on two Olympic teams for Canada.
“It’s easy to talk about, it’s easy to discuss. But it’s hard unless you’ve gone through it – just hope deep you have to go emotionally”. The past is the past and you can’t control it. We just tried to do our best job of giving the team an opportunity.
“It was really eye-opening what a championship team can do like them when they dial it up”, Hitchcock said. The Stars clinched the division with 109 points, while the Blues ended in close second with 107.
St. Louis didn’t care.
The Blues posted another fabulous regular season, but that didn’t impress anyone because the team has posted strong years before-in fact, all years in the last five seasons.
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“We had a sniff there”, Quenneville said.
