How the Blues make the postseason in 2026-27

The St. Louis Blues have spent the past three seasons teetering on the edge of the Western Conference playoff line. They missed by six points in 2023-24, squeaked in as the last wild card in 2024-25, and came up short in 2025-26. St. Louis has shown it can be a playoff team, but they have also shown how fast that can disappear.

The Western Conference needed 98, 96, and 90 points to get in over those three years, averaging about 95 points in an 82-game season. With this year's schedule expanding now to 84 games, somewhere between 92 and 94 points could keep them just outside the postseason, while 96 to 99 could be enough to push them to the postseason.

If they can reach 100 points, it takes most of the stress out of April, and pushing toward 108 or more means playing for home ice instead of a wild card. That 100-point mark works out to about 1.19 points per game, or roughly a 45-29-10 record. Win a little more than half of the time, and they get there. How exactly the Blues get there is the big question.

The numbers behind the point total

Playoff teams in the Western Conference have scored about 3.3 goals per game and allowed about 2.8, working out to roughly 175 goals scored and 236 goals allowed over 84 games. The Blues do not need a 300-goal offense. An 84-game regular season is a lot of hockey to play, but the Blues cannot afford to just give goals away.

The 2024-25 team made the playoffs, scoring 250 and allowing 231, with a plus-19 goal differential. A season later, they scored 230 and allowed 254, a minus-24. That 43-goal swing was the difference between the two seasons, and finding a way to get back to a plus-15 rating for the 2026-27 season would be a fair target for Blues Head Coach Jim Montgomery and his staff to push his team toward.

Playoff teams in the Western Conference have generally hovered between 22 and 24 percent on the power play and 78 and 80 percent on the penalty kill. The Blues don't need to be among the elite, but cannot afford to find themselves as a below-average special teams squad either. The Colorado Avalanche got in with a nearly 17 percent power play last season because everything else was excellent. The Blues cannot count on being that team and will need to start capitalizing on the man-advantage and find ways to keep the puck out of their net.

In-season check points

The real test for the Blues this season is not whether they can find a hot streak in March, but whether they are on pace while there is still plenty of the season left. The Blues could find themselves on one of two paths this season that should push them into the postseason. The first is a 100-point pace, which is the safe zone. At 100 points, even in an 84-game season, it should be more than enough to push them back to the playoffs. The second is a 95-point pace, which should be their floor. The cutoff has dropped over the past three seasons, so 95 is a realistic bar to stay in the race, but gives them no margin for error or injury.

After 20 games, 24 points in the standings is the first honest review for their team. If they can manage an 11-7-2 start, that should keep them on the 100-point pace, with a 10-7-3 start as the floor.

After 28 games, they should have 33 points to close out the opening third of the season, and finishing four or more points short of that means they are already chasing in a conference that does not give points back.

The biggest checkpoint will be the mid-season point at 42 games. If the Blues find themselves with 50 points at the halfway mark, the second half can still be about seeding, while 48 points keeps them at least in the postseason conversation. Anything near 42 points means they need the Pacific Division to fall apart and a lot of help from their competition the rest of the way. After 60 games, they should be between 68 and 71 points. After 70 games, between 79 and 83 points.

The Blues are not being asked to become the Avalanche, but proves the squad does stand a chance to make the postseason. The past three seasons have shown that a team in the West with a mid-90s to low-100 point total, with a decent goal differential, makes the playoffs more times than not. If they can start out of the gate well this season, hitting 24 points in 20 games, they give themselves a chance from the very beginning. Fall below them, and a hot streak in March is likely all for nothing.