Avalanche At Blues Final Score: Blues First In Central With 4-0 Shutout Of Avs

Tonight probably wasn’t a night that Blues fans expected to end with their team first place in the Central Division. The Detroit Red Wings nearly came back to defeat the Toronto Maple Leafs, and the Blues were playing a team on a 9-1-0 streak and a pretty hefty winning record against the Blues.

The Blues at home have the best record, now 17-3-2, and proved why tonight with total domination over the Colorado Avalanche. The first period saw two goals, the second period saw two goals, and the third period? It saw hits like this from T.J. Oshie on Kyle Quincey:

And hits like this one on Stefan Elliott:

Oshie’s hits are indicative of how big of a difference this year’s team seems to be over last year’s. They have, to use a word that I hate to use, “swag.” They have a confidence – a certain expectation of themselves and how they’re going to play – that seems to be nearly unbeatable.

The Blues outshot the Avs 39-15, so credit has to go to Colorado goaltender Giguere for being the only player with his head in tonight’s game for them. Credit also has to go to St. Louis goaltender Brian Elliott, who is second in the league with five shutouts.

The Blues will spend tonight atop the Central Division, but will begin Monday back beneath either Detroit or Chicago, as both teams play tomorrow. But for one night, the standings show the hard work that the Blues’ve put in this season is paying off.

Avalanche At Blues Second Period Score: Blues Continue Domination, Lead 4-0

As excellent as the Colorado Avalanche looked Friday night against the Chicago Blackhawks, that is how awful they look right now. As I mentioned to a friend, who is an Avs fan, they picked the right nights to play that way. The Blues have continued the steamrolling, taking advantage of a tired Avs defense and a re-energized power play that has scored five of its last 13 tries.

The Blues opened the scoring quickly and on the power play. With Paul Stastny off for a cross check that sent Alex Pietrangelo to the ice, the Blues power play — “simplified” as coach Ken Hitchcock described it to Darren Pang — went to work. Jason Arnott stayed with the puck and waited for J.S. Giguere to get too far out and leave the net open, and then he did this:

Less over-thinking, more intelligent-thinking has worked in fixing the PP (if you’d like to call 26th overall fixing it) for right now, and David Backes utilized it to the fullest extent in getting this one into the net. He got the puck out to the point, went back to the front of the net, and waited for a scrum and a rebound to tap home which is just what he got:

The Blues are up 18-7 in shots, which admittedly is a bit off of my projected 20-6 for this period, but I’ll take it. Also of note: Giguere is the reason that the score is not more out of hand. Sure, four goals on 18 shots isn’t good, but it could be a lot worse.

Avalanche At Blues First Period Score: Blues Dominate First 20 Minutes, Up 2-0

The Colorado Avalanche either used up all of their oomph on the Chicago Blackhawks Friday night, or else they’re working to a slow build. Hopefully it’s option A, because the Blues’ve ridden roughshod over the Avs so far in this game. It didn’t get too long to get started, either, as the Blues spent the first thirteen or so minutes in the Avalanche’s zone before Alex Pietrangelo got whistled for roughing and the Blues went on the penalty kill.

The first goal of the game initially looked like it was scored by T.J. Oshie, who took a pretty solid pass from Matt D’Agostini, but this shot deflects in off of Patrik Berglund’s thigh for his tenth of the season. Steener, your team lead in goals is safe:

The next goal looked to be a power play goal, but the shot from Kevin Shattenkirk went in right as T.J. Galliardi’s penalty ended. Nonetheless, it’s not surprising that Colorado goaltender J.S. Giguere didn’t see it. This shot went through a screen about 20 people deep. How it found the back of the net is beyond me:

The Blues’re up 10-2 on shots. I suck at math, but even I can figure out that they’re on pace for a 30-6 shot total here. Colorado needs to change that if they want to get on the board (they don’t have to, though). The Blues? They don’t need to change a thing.

Avalanche At Blues: Blues Need A Win Against Their Kryptonite

The Avalanche have had the Blues' number for quite a while. Hopefully the Blues can change this trend and get up to 53 points with another home win tonight.