Blues looking for quick turnaround and have tools to get it done

By Jim den Hollander  

Editor/Publisher 

Midwesthockey.info 

This is the fifth and final off-season story giving a quick look at the past season and an early look at the season ahead for the five Midwest-based NHL teams. 

Four seasons removed from hoisting the Stanley Cup for the first time in league history, the St. Louis Blues bottomed out in 2022-23, missing the NHL playoffs for the first time since 2017-18 season. 

The last time was followed up with that Stanley Cup win and the team is still strong enough to push up instead of down if things go its way in 2023-24. 

But, it will be a new era for the Blues with Stanley Cup heroes like Ryan O’Reilly, Vladimir Tarasenko and others now playing for other NHL teams.  

Simply put, it was a forgettable season as the team took a serious dip in nearly every category. 

After a 49-22-11 record in 2021-22 which ranked ninth best in the league and third in a highly competitive Central Division, the Blues slumped by 28 points with a 37-38-7 record, good enough for sixth in the Central, ahead of only the Arizona Coyotes and Chicago Blackhawks. 

After scoring 311 goals, fourth best in the league in 2021-22, the Blues dropped to 263, 16^th best this past season. Meanwhile Goals against ballooned from 242 – 11th in the league to 301, 27^th overall. 

Special teams took a massive hit as a powerplay ranked behind only the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2021-22 at 27 percent, dropped to 19.3 percent to rank 22^nd. Penalty Kill was equally as distraught, dropping from a fifth best kill rate of 84.1 percent to 30^th overall at 72.4. 

Sellers at the trade deadline, the Blues said goodbye to O’Reilly, Noel Acciari, Tarasenko, Niko Mikkola and Ivan Barbashev in February and March but then grabbed Jakub Vrana from the Red Wings before the deadline.  

Vrana is certainly a project player having gone through some issues off and on the ice in recent years, Vrana appeared in just five games with the Wings (along with some in Grand Rapids) before the trade. His best games though were the final 20 with the Blues where a rejuvinated Vrana potted 10 goals and collected 14 points. 

The Blues currently sit almost right on the $83 million salary cap and used free agency to mostly resign many of their minor league players. 

Among the interesting signings are Tyler Tucker, 23, a defenseman who split time between Springfield and St. Louis last season, playing his first 21 NHL games and collecting his first goal; 29-year-old goaltender Malcolm Subban added from Buffalo. Primarily an AHL fixture, Subban could provide some emergency experience as the goaltending chores should once again go primarily to Jordan Binnington while Joel Hofer, 22, a fourth round pick by the Blues in 2018 has honed his craft in Springfield and Utica while appearing in eight games with the Blues over the past two seasons. 

Hofer posted a 49-36-13 record in the AHL in three seasons with a 2.78 Goals Against Average and a Save Percentage of .912. He looked solid in two games with Team Canada another international gold medal at the World Championships this past spring. He helped the Canadian Juniors to the same prize in 2019/20. 

The Blues also resigned Alexei Toropchenko in its most recent signing and reacquired forwards Mackenzie MacEachern, Oskar Sundqvist in free agency and Sammy Blais in the Tarasenko trade with the Rangers. 

One of the bright spots in recent seasons, Jordan Kyrou put up a career best 37 goals in 2022-23 and he enters the new season as the team’s highest scorer and highest paid player. 

The lone off-season trade brought in Kevin Hayes, a leader as Assistant Captain in Philly who will be a good addition, on the second or third line with decent playmaking abilities. 

Robert Thomas, Brayden Schenn and Pavel Buchnevich could all be first line candidates along with Kyrou while Hayes, Brandon Saad, Kasperi Kapanen and Vrana could be slotted into second and third lines. 

Defensively, the Blues always seem strong, but the 300-plus goals against will need to be addressed. Veterans like Justin Faulk, Torey Krug, Colton Parayko, Nick Leddy, Marco Scandella and Robert Bortuzzo give the Blues and older, but experienced corps that is no doubt embarrassed about the way things went both on defense and special teams the previous season.  

Also, Binnington is coming off a rough season statistically and his frustrations were apparent on occasion. Left to the wolves on occasion, Binnington will be looking to return to form and the defense can help by limiting rebounds and close chances this season.  

It seems rare for a team to slip out of playoff contention and make a run back up without bottoming out, but the Blues have a chance to do that.  

The Central Division is a crazy division with haves like Colorado, Dallas and Minnesota and have nots like Chicago, Arizona along with a trio of teams – St. Louis, Nashville and Winnipeg who all slipped out of the playoffs and want to get back this season. 

Let the fight begin.