Blues excited to play for home crowd

ST. LOUIS - With a 2-0 lead in the best-of-7 series, the St. Louis Blues have returned home for Games 3 and 4.
There's no doubt Scottrade Center will be rockin' this afternoon (2 p.m., NBC, KMOX) on Easter Sunday.

"It's going to be buzzing. This place is always electric in the playoffs," said Blues forward Ryan Reaves. "Fans are usually excited when we get to this time of year, and I expect nothing less, especially with us coming home with a 2-0 lead. They're going to be excited and wanting more."
"Coming back home, forcing (the Wild) to deal with some of the things we had to deal with in their building as far as momentum, the crowd noise, we have to find a way to make it impactful," said Blues Head Coach Mike Yeo. "I remember coming into here in the playoffs, and this is an intimidating building."
Yes, the Blues are an intimidating club right now. For just the third time in franchise history, they have won the first two games of a playoff series on the road. In each of the previous two times, they swept the best-of-7 series in four games (2001 vs. Dallas and 1993 vs. Chicago).
In addition, the Blues have been stifling the Wild offensively in this series. Minnesota - one of the League's best offensive teams in the regular season - has yet to score a goal at even strength and has lit the lamp only twice: once with a 6-on-5 advantage and the other with a 5-on-3 power-play chance. So far, only Zach Parise has found a way to score for the Wild in this series.

"We stepped up our game a little bit in Game 2, but we know we still have a couple more notches to bring to our game," said Blues defenseman Joel Edmundson, who has goals in back-to-back games in this series. "We have the two wins in Minnesota, but the hard work starts now. It's a big game for them. They're going to bring their A-game and we just have to respond."
To this point, the Blues have to be happy with keeping the Wild in check offensively, but Yeo points out that things can change in an instant.
"Even in those games, there's been a lot of near misses and Jake (Allen) has had to be great," Yeo said. "It's not like we've found a magic formula that prevents them from getting to shots and chances. Sometimes it's Jake, sometimes it's a great defensive play of a great stick knocking a rebound out of there. Sometimes it's (penalty kill). Whatever the case is, we've found a way. That said, we know they're going to continue to try to pour more on us and we have to be ready for that.
"I've been on that side with that group over there where we were down 2-0 and came back to win a series. I know they're not going to go away lightly," Yeo added. "They're not just going to lose. We're going to have to beat them."