Game 2 Thoughts:
Our zone entries are great on the powerplay, and they're great when we skate the puck through the neutral zone. What do we do right after scoring on that 5 minute major? Return to stretch passes from deep in our zone, make poor passing decisions under no pressure on the breakout, and allow Colorado's neutral zone play to negate passes, turn the play the other way, or at the very least, force the Blues to ice it. Whoever is in charge of the breakout and the offense needs to change that up and recognize what's working and what isn't. Additionally, once we enter the zone, players have this habit of getting to the circle and then doing as button hook to pass to the trailing man -- which is nearly always read by the Avalanche and every person watching the game for an easy turnover and rush the other way. The correct play, 90% of the time, is to get the puck deep, force the Avs to play defense, and then when a turnover inevitably happens, the Avs have to reset, go 200 ft, and 5 Blues players will be in the same zone and in close proximity to the turnover. Instead, we give up a rush and the Avalanche turn it into sustained zone time.
Berube pulled the goalie too early. This is not hindsight as I said it when it happened. If you're going to pull the goalie with two minutes left, down one goal, on a night where we lost 75% of the faceoffs, you do so AFTER we gain possession. I would argue that you don't do that until 1 minute left, anyway, but if you're going to do it, that's how you do it. Terrible decision-making by Berube. That might be the first time I've ever said that about him as Blues' coach.
Schenn CANNOT start the game firing the puck from a low percentage area while under no pressure and with no screen, have it ring around the boards, give the Avs a free zone entry (he fired it so quickly most of the Avs players were still in the neutral zone), and allow them to score 35 seconds in. That was the stupidest play all game in a game full of them. That doesn't go in, and this might be a different game, as, at the very least, the Blues tie it up after the Hoffman goal.
This game was much worse than Game 1, but at the same time, the Blues were in a position to win it by the middle of the third period. Colorado doesn't have the legs to go all-out and deal with the Blues' physicality for a full 60 minutes. We were always going to get stomped in at least 2 games against the Avs, so nothing has changed there. It is now on the Blues to win the next two games if they want to win the series, or they will be losing in 5 or 6. Without Faulk, in addition to our other losses, we are in trouble.
Tarasenko has been doing well at everything except putting the puck in the net and actually applying REAL pressure on the Avs breakout -- something that all of our players are not doing. The Avs apply real aggressive pressure on our dmen, and the Blues seem content to do flybys. That said, Tarasenko has been a net positive in my eyes. He's definitely more effective than Sanford on that 3rd line, and despite not scoring, has a good portion of our most dangerous looks.
Hoffman continues to be one of our best players in all zones. I've been wanting to add Hoffman since he was available from Ottawa, and this is exactly why. I really hope we can find a way to re-sign him, but that doesn't mean I'm looking to get rid of Tarasenko, Schenn, Schwartz, etc. -- those takes are as asinine as they are unrealistic (though stupider things have happened).
The key will be, once again, stopping Mackinnon -- in addition to the things every team has to do to win: not make stupid plays. the Blues have the scoring to beat them, but it seems unlikely that we have the defense to play the transition game to best utilize it (2019 is when both of those things came together; before that it was the opposite problem). The Blues can still win this, but even winning the next game won't matter if it isn't coupled with a change in our approach to transition and removing that button hook play in the OZ.
ROFL Cosmic mojo it is then. Don't forget to wear your lucky underoos, and to keep the number of lines in the post to a multiple of your lucky number. We don't want to risk you upsetting the hockey gods and thus lose such a powerful weapon. That way next year you can do every GDT, and we can be the first team to go undefeated. We'll all make a fortune on bets.
