Blues leaning on 'physical' play, conclude homestand vs. Kraken

Coming out of the 4 Nations Face-Off break, St. Louis Blues coach Jim Montgomery staged an intense minicamp to instill a stronger work ethic and better attention to details.

That work paid off over the weekend when the Blues earned three of four points in home games against two Western Conference powers, the Winnipeg Jets and Colorado Avalanche.

The Blues will try to build off that when they face the Seattle Kraken Tuesday night to conclude their homestand.

After losing to the Jets 4-3 in a shootout Saturday, the Blues bounced back to defeat the Avalanche 3-1 Sunday.

"Three big points on the weekend," Blues goaltender Jordan Binnington said. "Our team played phenomenal. It's a great start for us coming out of the break."

The Blues were 2-5-1 in their last eight games before the break. Montgomery saw progress at both ends of the ice when they returned.

"We were relentless, I thought, in our checking," Montgomery said. "I thought our sticks were really good defensively. I thought we were physical. We separated people from the puck, and I thought our second man beat their second man to the puck, which allowed us to advance lines and gain zones."

He liked the determination he saw at the other end of the ice, too.

"I thought we were really hard offensively," Montgomery said. "Not passing up shots, having people at the net front, driving the net. We tried a lot of low slot line plays, east-west plays, and I thought our D-men were really good."

The Blues defeated the Kraken 3-2 in Seattle in their previous meeting, in the season opener for both teams. Binnington earned the victory with 30 saves and Jordan Kyrou scored twice for the Blues. The Kraken got goals from Eeli Tolvanen and former Blues defenseman Vince Dunn.

Seattle came out of the break with a three-game road trip. After winning 2-1 at Florida Saturday, the Kraken lost 4-1 at Tampa Bay the next day.

Kraken coach Dan Bylsma liked how his team kept pressing the Lightning while playing the second of back-to-back games. But they were done in by a breakdown with the man advantage while the game was still scoreless in the second period.

"Obviously, the power play gets an opportunity and they score a short-handed goal, and that's a big turning point in the match," Bylsma said. "That put us behind. I still thought we had enough to think we were going to come back and get a chance and get goals.

"But we think we had to be a little bit more determined on getting on the inside and getting a dirty one."

Shane Wright, who scored the only goal at Tampa Bay, has five goals and seven assists in his last 10 games.

After giving Ales Stezka his NHL debut in goal Sunday, the Kraken are likely to come back with Joey Daccord against the Blues. Daccord has won his last two starts while stopping 53 of 56 shots.

--Field Level Media