Small mistakes are all the separate the Dallas Stars and St. Louis Blues as their series shifts to a best-of-three.
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St. Louis can take a big-time lead in the series against Dallas on Thursday night.
Antti Niemi was the lone major lineup change for Game 3, replacing Kari Lehtonen in the Stars’ net after playing effectively the last two periods plus overtime in Game 2.
The symmetry of the game – two goals on awful errors, two goals on the power play, a 2-2 score (until OT, of course) – was indicative of the balance between the two teams.
The game didn’t start all that well for Dallas as Blues’ Vladimir Tarasenko scored a breakaway goal midway through the first period.
Given the Blues’ inability to cash in on more early chances when they were vulnerable, the Stars regrouped and forged ahead on goals by Radek Faksa and Patrick Sharp just 69 seconds apart. Blues fans, coaches and players aren’t likely getting too overconfident from that game lest they forget the meaningless 6-1 victory over the Wild in last year’s first round playoff loss.
Paul Stastny tied the game at 2 in the 2nd period for the Blues. That included Cody Eakin, who was stuffed while alone just in front of Elliott after scoring the overtime victor on the road two days earlier. For all intents and purposes, Saturday’s contest is Game 1 of a best-of-three series.
The Blues and Stars will play game 5 on NBC at noon on Saturday.
This Blues Stanley Cup Playoff Interview is brought to you by Cedar Creek Resort. It’s our game. It’s been that way all season.”ABOUT THE BLUES: St. Louis captain David Backes had a spotty playoff history with only five goals in his previous past five postseasons combined, but he has matched that total with five goals in 10 games against Chicago and Dallas”.
What it means: This was a crucial game for the Stars, who were blown out in Game 2 and showed a lot of character in tightening up their game and finding a way to wrestle back home-ice advantage with this win. In the meantime, Eakin is tied with Jason Spezza for second in assists with seven.
We would need extra hockey tonight to finish this one.
Now, the Blues look to take a commanding lead in the series. We got embarrassed, they embarrassed us.
The well-traveled defenseman filling in for his team’s most indispensable player scored the first goal.
“When we get away from our building, I think we play a simple game”, Brouwer said. You need to really narrow your focus; we’ve learned over time to just eliminate all the talk and whatever happened the day before, we leave it right there and focus on us.
“Overall, Ryan knows what he needs to do to play better, but it’s not like he’s played poorly”, said coach Jack Capuano. “We understand this series is only to get tougher”.
“I don’t want to get into going after a guy – wrong time to do it”, Hitchcock said. He only played in three games in the regular season but took the place of RW Valeri Nichushkin….
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Putting their foot on the gas and on the Stars’ neck would seal the deal – every game, as Ken Hitchcock said, requires them to get better lest the Stars catch up. “It may be ripe, but you can let it continue to ripen and make sure players are overly ready so that when called upon there is no period of adjustment”.
