The
first win can be always the toughest to achieve once a losing streak
sets in.
For
the St. Louis Blues, it’s time to build now.
They
trended in the right direction the past three games and finally shed
the monkey off their backs with a hard-fought 3-2 win over the
Edmonton Oilers on Monday.
Now
the Blues (4-7-2) want to build in the right direction after losing
seven straight (0-5-2) when they kick off a quick two-game trip
starting Wednesday against the Washington Capitals (6-5-1) at Capital
One Arena in Washington, D.C. (6:30 p.m.; TNT, ESPN 101.1-FM).
The
Blues, who are 8-2-1 the past 11 games against the Capitals, rallied
from a 2-0 deficit, winning on a goal by Pius Suter with 1:23
remaining in the third period to complete the comeback.
“It
felt good,” Blues
center Robert Thomas said after the win Monday.
“Guys have been putting in a lot of work. We’re building a
foundation here to be more consistent. It was nice that it paid off.
To go down two and just keep on pushing, keep on playing, that’s
what’s made us successful in the past is just keep on trucking
forward. We did that tonight and it was a big win, not only just to
win but come from behind and win, it gives our group a lot of
confidence.
“It’s
tough (losing). I think just bringing some life, bringing some energy
and in the fashion like we did it, coming from behind against a top
team, that should bring us a lot of confidence. Moving forward, we’ve
got a big stretch of games here, not too much time in between.
Confidence and energy is going to be huge.”
That
kind of resolve can go a long way.
“It’s
really important. Even during this slide, may be hard to believe, but
the belief in the room is that we’re a good hockey team,” Blues
coach Jim Montgomery said. “I talked about it earlier, there’s a
lot of analytics pointing with the expected goals-for and against and
what quadrant we were in the last 10 years. The quadrant that we’re
in, we haven’t missed the playoffs. That’s why we felt a lot of
good things. Now, that’s just one win. We’ve got to start
building. We’ve got to keep building, because I think that we can
be a really good hockey team if we keep building it the right way.”
It’s
why the Blues continue to trust the process.
“You
obviously keep going and pushing, pushing, pushing, but sometimes you
start gripping the stick a little too hard,” Suter said after
Monday’s win. “Maybe it loosened up a little bit. I think today
was a really good game, stayed above guys and kind of let the game
come to us. And then things opened up like the chances we got. It was
kind of good to loosen the grip a little bit.
“We
had so many chances, so to kind of just get through and get the two
points to kind of kick-start this thing, it’s good for the
confidence for everybody.”
–
– –
The
Blues are making two lineup changes against the Capitals, with Nathan
Walker returning after being a healthy scratch Monday for the first
time, and in his place, Mathieu Joseph will be a healthy scratch for
the first time this season.
Also,
Logan Mailloux comes into the lineup for Matthew Kessel after being
scratched the past two games.
–
– –
Blues
Projected Lineup:
Pavel
Buchnevich-Robert Thomas-Jimmy Snuggerud
Brayden
Schenn-Pius Suter-Jordan Kyrou
Dylan
Holloway-Dalibor Dvorsky-Oskar Sundqvist
Alexey
Toropchenko-Nick Bjugstad-Nathan Walker
Philip
Broberg-Colton Parayko
Tyler
Tucker-Justin Faulk
Cam
Fowler-Logan Mailloux
Jordan
Binnington will start in goal; Joel
Hofer
will be the backup.
Healthy
scratches include Mathieu Joseph, Alexandre Texier and Matthew
Kessel. Jake Neighbours (leg) is out.
–
– –
Capitals
Projected Lineup:
Anthony
Beauvillier-Dylan Strome-Alex Ovechkin
Aliaksei
Protas-Connor McMichael-Tom Wilson
Sonny
Milano-Hendrix Lapierre-Ryan Leonard
Brandon
Duhaime-Nic Dowd-Justin Sourdif
Martin
Fehervary-John Carlson
Jakob
Chychrun-Matt Roy
Rasmus
Sandin-Trevor van Riemsdyk
Logan
Thompson will start in goal; Charlie Lindgren will be the backup.
Healthy
scratches include Spencer Smallman, Declan Chisholm and Dylan
McIlrath. Pierre-Luc Dubois (lower body) and Ethen Frank (upper
body) are out.
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