If someone would have told the St. Louis Blues less than a week ago they had a chance to go .500 on a four-game road trip, they would be ecstatic about it.
Considering how it started, with identical 5-1 losses against the the woeful San Jose Sharks and powerful Los Angeles Kings, things didn't look bright for the Blues.
But they followed it up with a 3-1 win against the Anaheim Ducks, and did in fact, close out the trip with a wild 6-5 win over the Arizona Coyotes on Wednesday and fly hole for Thanksgiving 10-7-1 and in a playoff spot heading into their day off on Thursday.
This one didn't come without any challenges, but the Blues found a way and won their second game against the Coyotes this season by one goal, their only true one-goal wins this season (they defeated the Seattle Kraken 2-1 but it came via shootout).
Let's take a look at the three keys to this crazy win at Mullett Arena:
1. Persistence, overcoming adversity -- The Blues haven't had a whole lot of adverse games this season.
Most have either been one-sided one way or one-sided the other.
A game that had four lead changes, coach Craig Berube has spoken in the past about wanting to see his team respond when down in a game, that the Blues weren't always going to be ahead.
Well, they fell behind twice in this one and overcame each deficit, and once they gained their fourth lead of the night, they were able to buckle up and not give the Coyotes much of a chance to tie it.
The Blues have now outscored their opponents 19-12 in the third period this season, and 14-3 in their 10 wins.
2. Huge penalty kill produces two shorthanded goals -- One of the turning points came at 2:32 of the second period when the Blues, down 3-2, could have really been in a bind had Arizona scored a power-play goal and gone ahead by two.
Scott Perunovich was in the box for holding the stick, but not only did the Blues' penalty kill, who was 2-for-2 in the game, not allow a power-play goal, but they gained the momentum back with two shorthanded goals by Nick Leddy at 3:40 to the the game 3-3 and Alexey Toropchenko at 4:13 to forge ahead 4-3.
Even though the Blues allowed the Coyotes to regain the lead, those goals seemed to really fuel the rest of their game.
It gave them a league-tying high six shorthanded markers for the season, tied with the Dallas Stars, and more fuel to stay aggressive and read plays where they can jump pucks and head north trying to gain an edge while down a man.
It worked twice in this situation.
3. Hofer stabilizing the net -- Joel Hofer wasn't supposed to play Wednesday, but when he was called into action after Arizona took a 5-4 lead, taking over for Jordan Binnington midway through the second period, Hofer was perfect when he was cold.
Hofer didn't have to see a ton of rubber for the 32 minutes he played, but he stopped all 12 shots he faced, and some of them came at key moments in the game.
Binnington allowed five goals on 13 shots and the game was chaotic at the time of his departure, but Hofer came in and played a calm game and slammed the door shut to help the Blues gain a valuable two points.
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