The St. Louis Blues were laid to rest on the evening of May 25, 2016, by the San Jose Sharks. Like every other team that has faced the teal and black, the Blues became Shark bait.
They are preceded by the Minnesota Wild, Florida Panthers, Philadelphia Flyers, Detroit Red Wings, Los Angeles Kings, New York Rangers, Chicago Blackhawks, Anaheim Ducks, New York Islanders, Washington Capitals, Nashville Predators, and Dallas Stars. The Blues are survived by the San Jose Sharks, Pittsburgh Penguins, and Tampa Bay Lightning, who remain in the battle for the Stanley Cup.
Nemesis Knockout
The St. Louis Blues in recent years have struggled to make it out of the second round and had been plagued by the Blackhawks. They believed that this was their year to get by their nemesis, and they were correct. But it did not come easy.
The story of the series was Brian Elliott, who was absolutely fantastic throughout. Vladimir Tarasenko, Jaden Schwartz, and David Backes were also consistently putting a dagger in the hearts of Blackhawks fans everywhere. It was a complete team effort, and the Blues finally slew their dragon.
In what may have been one of the best series of the 2016 playoffs, the Blues took the Blackhawks to seven games. However, once again, they failed to close on a 3-1 series lead, and the Blackhawks pushed them to the brink with multiple overtime games, including one that took two extra frames.
However, the Blues finally managed to get over the fence, and it turned out the grass was greener on the other side. They would face the Dallas Stars.
Big D Put out to Pasture
The Stars were the next to face off against the Blues, and they were considered the powerhouse in the Western Conference as they had dominated much of the regular season.
Dallas started the series looking like contenders, with Radek Faksa and Mattias Janmark contributing early. The Stars won the first game and lost the second in a hotly contested overtime effort, with Backes again playing the hero.
However, anyone with a little hockey knowledge could see that there were some leaks in the foundation down in Texas.
The Blues capitalized on the two-headed monster that stood in net for Dallas. The two Finnish netminders were so disastrous that it became a matter of how long one netminder could last instead of which one would start a game. If the Stars were a baseball team, they’d have run through their entire bullpen before the end of the first period on several occasions.
In Game 3, the Stars were routed to the tune of 6-1 as Backes, Alex Steen, Troy Brouwer (the Game 7 hero in Chicago), and Tarasenko had their way with Antti Niemi and Kari Lehtonen, who each allowed three goals. The tag team of netminders started in Game 2 after Lehtonen ‘let one in’ a few too many times. Unfortunately, Niemi didn’t say no enough either.
Again, Elliott was outstanding, and the Blues’ stars were firing on all cylinders for much of the series. St. Louis annihilated Dallas in an embarrassing Game 6 in which the Stars failed to make a push as they lay down in front of a sell out crowd at the Scottrade Center.
The series should have been about two of the best teams in the league, but St. Louis made the Stars look like a house league team with their leaky netminding and soft defensive game. It certainly didn’t help Dallas that Jamie Benn struggled to find his scoring touch, and the team was forced to play without Tyler Seguin on their top line due to an Achilles injury.
However, if we’re being honest, the real Achilles heel came in the form of the wonder twins in net. As in, we wonder what Jim Nill was thinking.
Shark Baited
The St. Louis Blues looked to be a favorite to advance to the Stanley Cup Final after dispatching two powerhouses in the West. After all, San Jose had flown under the radar most of the season. They weren’t expected to make it out of the first round against the Kings. Then they were supposed to fall to the defensively gifted Nashville Predators.
Neither of those things happened as the Sharks quickly dispatched the Kings in five games, then followed that up by taking the Preds out in seven. To be fair, it was six, as the Preds failed to show up for Game 7. At any rate, the theme here was that no one expected the Sharks to get this far, so the Blues were finally going to make it to the Stanley Cup Final in the Hitchcock era.
(record scratch)
That’s not what happened.
In Game 1, the score said 2-1 in favor of the Blues, but they were largely outplayed by the Sharks from buzzer to buzzer as San Jose outshot the Blues 32-23. Even though Backes and his Blues grabbed that first victory (and Joe Thornton‘s beard), fans were already on edge about how this series could go down. The Sharks were a surprise and not the good kind for Blues fans.
Of course, Brian Elliott has been one of the stars of the playoffs thus far, but Martin Jones was looking to steal his thunder early. Jones played seven periods without allowing a goal and whitewashed the Blues in Games 2 and 3, giving the Sharks a 2-1 edge. Jake Allen was tasked with his first work of the series in Game 3, stopping the two shots that he faced. However, he inherited a 3-0 deficit, and his team failed to score.
In Game 4, the Blues found a rhythm and managed to chase Jones for backup James Reimer after 30 minutes of work and four goals allowed. The Blues looked ready to take back the series with a dominant 6-3 win in San Jose.
Allen was the starter in Game 4, not because Elliott had a bad game two nights earlier, but simply because Coach Ken Hitchcock thought it would spark the team. It worked. Once.
Unfortunately, Tarasenko was the firework that failed to launch…again. He was blanked in the first five games of the series. In fact, in four of the first five games, Tarasenko didn’t even take more than two shots on goal (he took six in Game 2 loss). He would find the mark twice in the final game, scoring both of St. Louis’ goals in the third period, but the Sharks had already started the bloodletting with a 4-0 feeding frenzy sparked by Joel Ward‘s two goals.
For the Blues and Tarasenko, it was a case of too little, too late. Ward, Jones, and Joe Pavelski were to be the heroes on this night, and not even Tarasenko could rain on their parade as the Sharks would advance to the Stanley Cup Final for the first time in the history of the franchise.
Sunny Side Up
On the bright side, Tarasenko and his wife, Yana, welcomed a brand new baby boy named Aleksandr during the series. Alas, he will be spared the uncomfortable and somewhat unsanitary (have you seen what people put in that thing?) Stanley Cup crib this year as the Blues fell short once again.
Tomorrow, the fans will riot and ask for Hitchcock’s head on a stick. So many hopes dashed as their Stanley Cup dreams have been turned into a nightmare.
Tee time will be at 10 am on Friday. Godspeed Blues fans.
Please feel free to share your condolences in the comments below.