3 Takeaways From Mammoth’s 7-4 Win Over Blues

“It’s awesome scoring in this league,” Cooley said. “It was a great game. I thought we let off a little bit in the second, but overall, it was a great team win.”

Obviously, Cooley was the main story of the game with his hat trick and his four points, but his line of Peterka and Guenther, which has been dubbed the “youth line,” was excellent as well. Both Guenther and Peterka finished with three assists each. 

Head coach André Tourigny liked what he saw from the line. In the last game against the Colorado Avalanche, he thought the line had to improve and learn from mistakes. Thursday saw the line improve to Tourigny’s liking.

“Those guys are really competitive, and they want to be really good,” Tourigny said. “We had some teaching moments from the last game, and they took it the right way, and they arrived tonight, and they had that kind of performance. I’m really proud of them.”

Even the captain, Clayton Keller, who had a remarkable performance himself, liked what he saw out of the second line. He was really impressed by Cooley’s game.

Outside of the Mammoth, Keller has been around Cooley quite a bit. The two went to the World Championship together over the summer and helped Team USA capture gold in the tournament. They then attended Olympic Orientation Camp together. After seeing him play so much, Cooley has become one of Keller’s favorite players to watch.

“Cools (Cooley) is one of my favorites,” Keller said. “The way he plays his speed, his skill, he can really do it all. I believe in him so much. It’s great to see him get rewarded. That’s a heck of a period. Three (goals) and one (assist) in the first period, that’s tough to beat, and it was pretty quick too.”

With Cooley’s contract expiring at the end of this season, this could be the start of a dominant offensive run for him. He’s had chances throughout the first couple of games of the season, but hasn’t really scored like we know he can. Perhaps a dominant game like this from him is the start of that. Either way, it was an elite game from the young forward. One that placed him in the history books for the Mammoth.

A Usual Suspect Strikes Again

After Cooley quieted down a little bit, it was time for another player to step up in a big way. It wouldn’t be a game against the Blues if hometown hero Keller didn’t score. When it came time for the Mammoth to lock the game down, it was Keller who scored the eventual game-winning goal to conclude the second period.

At center ice with 37 seconds remaining in the second, Nick Schmaltz slid the puck to Keller, who entered the Blues zone and unloaded a fantastic shot on net to beat Binnington and score the fifth Mammoth goal of the game.

Keller later scored the empty net goal to seal the deal for the Mammoth. It was the 200th goal of his career, making him the fifth player in the 2016 draft class to reach that mark. 

“I think Keller is terrible,” Tourigny joked.

In all seriousness, Tourigny liked what he saw from his captain and liked specifically that he stepped up in a big way during the game.

Like how Keller complimented Cooley, it happened vice versa as well. Cooley loves playing with Keller, especially because of the way he leads by example and his determination to win.

“He’s an unbelievable player, a great leader for us,” Cooley said. “He’s super competitive and gets us going. That was a big goal. The empty netter was obviously huge to steal the deal, but I think it was the fifth goal that was a big one, and gave us a lot of momentum going into the next period.”

Similar to Cooley’s line, Keller’s linemate Schmaltz was also really good on Thursday. Schmaltz scored the sixth goal of the game while producing two assists and now has 11 points in his past five games. Keller himself also has 11 points in the past couple of games.

It’s been a great run for Schmaltz and Keller over the past couple of games. The duo is key to the Mammoth’s success. They’ve been better than expected to start the season. So much so that Keller himself broke even more records than mentioned above on Thursday.

Records Broken, Achievements Met

There were a lot of franchise records that were set and personal achievements that were met during Thursday’s game.

As mentioned, Cooley is now in the Mammoth’s record books for fastest hat trick and the first natural hat trick. It is also the third hat trick in Mammoth history and the second in Cooley’s career.

Keller’s second goal was the 200th of his career. However, he also hit the 100-point mark with the goal, making him the first player in Mammoth history to do so. It also makes him the fastest player since the league expanded past six teams to become a franchise’s first 100-point player.

Finally, the five-game winning streak is the longest in Mammoth franchise history. The 7-4 win also matches the record of amount of goals scored in a single game by the team.

It was a big win for the Mammoth. Especially considering the last time the two teams met, the Blues blew the Mammoth out 6-1 to clinch the final playoff spot in the Western Conference. It seemed like it was going to be an easy win, but the Blues pushed back. However, no one panicked, and the team kept it together to eventually win the game.

“It was not easy when they had a push back, and they scored goals,” Tourigny said. “It’s not always easy to stay composed. Our guys did, so we didn’t feel panic. Obviously, some frustration, but no panic. That was pretty mature of our bench.”

As mentioned, it was once again a challenging second period for the Mammoth, but their big players came in clutch at the end of the middle frame and in the third. It also helped that the power play was doing well, operating at a 50% success rate during the game.

At the end of the day, the Mammoth secured the win. They are now 6-2-0 this season, which puts them second in the division only behind the Avalanche. On top of that, they are 3-2-0 against divisional opponents. While that needs to improve, they’ll have the chance to do that in the next two games, both of which will fall into that category.

The Mammoth will be heading into those games on a high, but they’ll need to keep playing their best to beat the Minnesota Wild and the Winnipeg Jets. There’s still some stuff to fix heading into Saturday’s game, but the team knows they can continue winning.

“You can’t get too high or too low in this league, because it’ll come back to haunt you,” Cooley said. “We just gotta stay level-headed, keep doing what we’re doing. There’s stuff to clean up a little bit, but I think once we do that, it’s going to continue to be good.”

Like Cooley, Keller isn’t trying to get ahead of himself either. After so many years in this league, he knows the league has a way to give you your worst battles when you feel like you’re on top. Last season, the Mammoth went through that after a fantastic first couple of games, which saw them start the season 3-0-0. 

For him, a win streak is great. However, the Mammoth need to stay consistent and continue to improve in order to keep winning and eventually clinch a playoff spot.

“This league humbles you fast, and you have to continue to get better each and every day,” Keller said. “If you don’t, you’re gonna get beat, and it’s gonna take a while to get out of it. So I think (the goal is to) just try to get better every single day.”

It is only the start of a four-game road trip. On this trip, the team will play a back-to-back, and all four teams they play, including the Blues, made the playoffs last season. However, if the Mammoth can continue to improve playing a full 60 minutes of hockey and continue to score the way they’ve been doing, then they’ll stand a real chance of doing well in the Midwest.

The Mammoth will face the Wild next on Saturday. The Wild are 3-4-1 and are coming off a 4-1 loss to the New Jersey Devils. The two faced off against each other four times last season, with the Mammoth winning three of those games, including in their most recent meeting in February, which was a 6-1 final.