St. Louis Blues coach Drew Bannister said that the team would need to be comfortable playing in uncomfortable situations in order to make their way through this gauntlet stretch of games in January.
That means it's OK to be either up a goal, tied after two periods or down by a goal; so as long as the game is there for the taking, the Blues needed to be in those situations.
For the second straight game, they were tied through two periods and found a way in the end, winning another 2-1 game, this time in a shootout against the Carolina Hurricanes at PNC Arena on Saturday.
Let's take a look at those three keys that were contributing factors in a stingy game:
1. Committing to playing fundamentally sound D, solid goaltending -- There were some moments when the Blues looked like they were going to crack under Carolina's aggressive forecheck, and the Hurricanes do have a good one.
But for the most part, the Blues (20-17-1) made good decisions with the puck, aside for large swaths of the second period, but they didn't allow the Hurricanes (22-13-5) to dictate like they tend to do to their opponents, and the Blues were committed to reloading plays when needed instead of trying to force feed pucks.
In the second period, they needed Jordan Binnington to make the necessary saves, and he did when the Blues weren't at their best. But when the game was uncomfortable in the third period, again, the Blues were patient and locked it down, not allowing any Grade A scoring chances.
2. Fourth line chipping in -- Teams tend to just have their fourth lines play solid shifts and not make mistakes, limiting their ice time to the 10-minute-ish range.
But when they contribute goals like Nathan Walker did to give the Blues a 1-0 lead in the first period, it's an added bonus.
Oskar Sundqvist had the flipper that was able to spring Walker in for his goal, and Jakub Vrana, who returned to the lineup after being called up from Springfield, all did what was expected of them and were able to neutralize their opposition when on the ice, didn't turn pucks over and won their battles when on the ice in a low-scoring game, 1-0.
3. Neighbours, Schenn come up large in shootout -- It initially didn't look good.
When Sebastian Aho was able to beat Binnington in the first round (fourth overall) of sudden death, it was up to the Blues to keep things alive.
Jake Neighbours did just that in his first shootout attempt in the NHL; he beat Antti Raanta five-hole to run the shootout to a fifth round, and when Binnington stopped Jordan Martinook, Schenn delivered the knockout blow and victory for the Blues in what had to feel good for the captain since he hadn't scored in the previous 15 games and had gone a career-long 11 straight games without a point.
Perhaps a shootout winner will get Schenn going offensively, because nobody knows more than him how much he not only wants it but needs it.
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