Hello all. Throughout the season I’ll being doing these “week in review” pieces. The plan is to drop one every Monday. They’ll focus on the Blues: looking back at how they played in the last week, looking forward to the next week, and following along with any developing storylines. I’ll also include some tidbits from around the league on some interesting stats, notable performances, or just things you should know to be a well-rounded hockey fan. Without any further ado…
The Blues—Highs and Lows
This was a back and forth week for the Blues, and that’s putting it lightly. St. Louis followed up a 4-1 win in their season opener by getting blown out 8-0, both versus Colorado. Here’s some things I noticed during these two games:
Penalties, and an inability to kill them. This is inarguably the most glaring issue for the Blues through two games. They have an unbelievably bad penalty killing percentage at 45.5%, far and away the worst mark of any team that’s played yet. For reference, anything beneath 80% should be a red flag. This is obviously an issue that needs to be figured out, but it’s made much worse by the quantity of penalties they’re taking; in Friday’s blowout loss, the Avalanche were gifted 7 power plays, scoring on 5 of them. Giving up 5 power play goals essentially guarantees a loss, but so does giving up 7 power plays. The penalty differential is a serious issue—as serious as the penalty killing deficiencies—and the discipline needs to be stepped up. The worst on the team has been Robert Bortuzzo, the only Blue that has taken two minor penalties already. Not what you want to see through two games, especially by a guy that’s supposed to be one of your penalty killers. But hey, the way their shorthanded play has gone so far, maybe it’s best to not have those guys out there.
The “top” line. Despite being outscored 9-4 through two games, one of which was an absolute embarrassment, the Blues actually have played pretty well at even strength, with one notable exception: the first line. The Schenn-O’Reilly-Perron line has gotten absolutely dominated at even strength in terms of shot attempts. Ryan O’Reilly, normally an elite play driver, leads the trio with a terrible 33.67 xGF%. This means that, based on the quantity and quality of shots by both teams while this line is on the ice, they are expected to be giving up 2 goals for every 1 they score. That’s really bad, especially for the first line. And sure, they’ve been matched up with Nathan Mackinnon, arguably the best player in the league right now. But O’Reilly just won a Selke trophy, and he’s widely known as one of the best defensive players in the league. He’s also capable of carrying his linemates; Schenn and Perron are competent defensively, but not elite. Not even a matchup against Mackinnon can excuse these numbers. This will improve—it must if the Blues hope to win—and it’s looking like this line will get broken up anyway.
Robert Thomas: elite? There were no bright spots in Friday’s game, but one of the several in Wednesday’s game was the elite play of Robert Thomas. He put up two points (both assists, both filthy) and looked like he had the puck on a string. He looked comfortable, confident, and ready to prove my bold prediction correct. While he’s on the ice the Blues are dominating in shot attempts, with a 56.5 FF% (which measures unblocked shot attempts), paired with a 64.5 xGF%. The actual GF% with Thomas on the ice is 67.8%; it’s a good sign to have xGF% and GF% so close together, as it means that Thomas is producing as expected, so this should be a maintainable pace as long as luck stays on his side. Something surprising about Thomas’s play so far, however, is that he hasn’t taken a single shot attempt at even strength. Every other forward on the team has at least one, and only Marco Scandella also has zero. There are two takeaways from this in my mind: 1. Robert Thomas’s line is dominating in shot attempts and goals, and the best shooter literally hasn’t even shot yet. 2. Robert Thomas needs to shoot the damn puck sometimes. They can only get better.
The goaltending. I’ll keep this brief since it’s hard to really read into goaltending after two games, especially when one of them is an 8-0 loss. Binnington’s save percentage is 0.900—pretty bad. On the other hand, his even strength save percentage is 0.947—pretty good. I don’t think Binnington is blameless on some of those power play goals, in fact I think some of them were weak, but overall he’s played well through the first two, and much to my chagrin I can’t really complain. Also, as far as I’m concerned Ville Husso hasn’t made his NHL debut yet. We’re collectively forgetting that he ever played Friday. Okay, cool.
The next week. The Blues have 3 games on the docket this upcoming week—2 against the Sharks and one against the Kings, all at home. These are some weak teams, and especially after that game Friday I think anything less than 2 wins in regulation this week would be disappointing. The Blues need a solid bounce back performance, and these are the teams that it should be easiest to do it against. Let’s see if they do.
Around the League
Kirill Kaprizov is legit. Kaprizov, who plays for the Minnesota Wild, is an absolute stud and just a joy to watch. He’s dynamic, explosive, and in that stage in his career where no one has played against him and no one knows how to stop him. He has 4 points in 2 games, with 2 of those (1 goal and 1 assist) coming on OT game winners. There’s really no better way to burst onto the scene. This guy helps solidify the Wild as the fourth-best team in the West, at least.
The Penguins shaky start. After dropping their first two, Pittsburgh finally picked up a win on Sunday, albeit in a shootout. It’s early, and the Penguins still have the star power (Sydney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin) to win any game against any team. But gone are the days of the Penguins being an elite team in the East, and there’s actually a very realistic chance that this isn’t a playoff team as it’s currently built. There’s lots of games left to play, but still. Which brings me to my next point…
The East and the North are wide open. The West and the Central divisions have a clear hierarchy of elite teams and not-so-elite teams. The other two divisions, however, are really up for grabs by almost anyone. Sure, there are teams that should fizzle out sooner rather than later, like Ottawa and New Jersey. There are also some teams that should rise to the top and stay there, like Toronto, Boston, and Philadelphia. Other than that, who knows? This first week has made that parity of these divisions abundantly clear.
All stats from Evolving Hockey unless otherwise noted.
Brendan Komp (@brendanperson)
Neutral Zone Trap 