Goals: Tarasenko (9, 10), Schwartz (10) and Steen (2)
Record 13-5-1
My Thoughts on Tonight's Game
- We knew that we couldn't keep up the pace we were on for an entire season, so don't panic, we still lead the West.
- If you like to see goals then this was your game to watch. However, if you're a Blues fan then you surely weren't happy with the number of goals the other team scored, especially in the third period (5!).
- Yeo shook up the lines a bit by adding Beau Bennett to the Schenn and Schwartz line. Bennett had been a healthy scratch for the past four games and to be honest, I thought he looked a bit rusty out there. Tarasenko moved to the line with Steen and Stastny. Sobotka moved down to the third line with Sundqvist and Jaskin.
- St. Louis struck first when Tarasenko scored 3:32 into the first period. Parayko made a nice drop pass and #91 flicked a wrister past the Calgary goalie, who was screened by one of his own men on the play.
- The theme of the game of "you score, now we score" would begin to play out when Calgary answered just 1:32 later on a goal by Mark Jankowski who scored on a one-timer from between the circles right in front of Jake Allen to beat him high on the glove side. Jankowski came on the ice after the puck had entered the zone and the Blues just didn't see him and he was all alone.
- Two-thirds of the way through the period it looked like Allen was settling in. He made several big saves, but got beat again when Grandpa Jaromir Jagr made a nice pass to Jankowski in front of the net at the 13:45 mark to give Calgary the lead.
- The Blues put on some nice offensive pressure right away with the Schenn, Schwartz and Bennett line and drew a penalty, to give the Blues a power play at the 15 minute mark in the first. Schwartz tied it again about a minute later after Steen broke his stick on his slap shot attempt and kind of missed the puck. As it slid on across the ice it came right to Schwartz who buried it for his 10th goal of the season.
- No goals were scored in the second and Calgary turned up the defense. St. Louis could only manage 4 shots in the period. They also were whistled for a "too many men on the ice" penalty, which seems to be our favorite penalty. By the end of the period Yeo had Tarasenko back on the line with Schenn and Schwartz. Bennett dropped back and played with Sundqvist and Jaskin.
- Starting goalie for Calgary, Mike Smith looked like he took a puck off the side of the head at the end of the first period and didn't return after the first intermission. Backup goalie, Eddie Lack played the last two periods. St. Louis had beaten him earlier in the year at home, putting 5 in the goal against him. I thought they would turn up the pressure and put a lot of shots on goal but Calgary protected him well.
- Calgary scored first in the last period for a 3-2 lead but the score would more than double from there before the night was over.
- Steen scored 6 minutes later to knot the score again, but Calgary soon earned a power play after a scrum around the Calgary net. Jaskin had skated hard at the net and with a defender draped on him, he skated into the post. Calgary took exception to his hard charge and tempers flared. Sundqvist was called for roughing against two different players and ended up on the short end with 2 guys in the box while only one Flame was penalized. Coach Yeo was not happy.
- Calgary scored on the power play, but once again the Blues answered just 12 seconds later on Vladi's second goal of the night.
- Just when you thought we were gaining some momentum and things felt like we would maybe win this one, the Flames scored again just 1:46 later. This time, there was no answer from St. Louis. Calgary added two more goals, including one "empty-netter" for the final score of 7- 4.
- Although it seemed like we were in the game up until the last few minutes, the stat sheet shows that Calgary outplayed the Blues in some important categories.
- Shots on Goal: C 37 StL 24
- Face offs: C 59% StL 41%
- Takeaways: C 20 StL 12
- I thought we looked a little rusty at times. Maybe the line changes knocked off some of the timing. I try to keep things positive and not be too critical, but I would rather have seen Bennett added to the third line from the beginning. I think a week after the line of Schenn, Schwartz and Tarasenko is named one of the top three in the league it doesn't make sense to shake that up with a guy who hadn't played for 4 straight games but I'm not getting paid to coach. I understand that sometimes you gotta shake things up and that's what our coaching staff did. I stand behind them.
- Need to get things back on track. The Edmonton Oilers are up next on Thursday night.
#AllTogetherNowStL #LGB #SpreadArisLight
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