One: Keep the feet moving – The Kraken skated, skated and skated some more against the Carolina Hurricanes. And they hit them – man, did they ever. Jamie Oleksiak laid out Seth Jarvis with a clean check in open ice he won’t soon forget. Anyhow, that’s the key to Kraken success. It involves a lot of forechecking and backchecking and work ethic.
The Kraken did all that and more against Carolina. They might have beaten them to every single loose puck in the second period.
The St. Louis Blues don’t have nearly as good a record as the Hurricanes. But we saw what happened the last time the Kraken stopped skating and were beaten to just about every puck. That also happened to be their prior defeat last Thursday against the Blues on the road. They cannot take this team lightly. And they may have to lay on the body even more against a St. Louis team that’s bigger than Carolina. Bottom line is, whether hitting or not, the Kraken have to skate, skate and outskate this opponent and beat them to pucks at their own net front when the Blues shoot it on goal and look for rebounds.
Two: Keep blocking shots – One way the Kraken can keep the Blues from getting shots to the net and hunting rebounds is to not let them get shots to the net. The Kraken had 23 blocked shots against the Hurricanes. They’ve averaged 16.4 blocked shots per game at home so 23 is a pretty high number.
And they’ll need to keep it up. One reason the Kraken have won five in a row at home is they’ve kept the goals against down. They’ve allowed just seven total goals in the five games and just one goal apiece in three of them. You can’t score if you don’t shoot – on net, at least. They blocked 20 shots at home against New Jersey to get this whole home streak going back in late January.
In St. Louis, they blocked 11 shots and gave up 32. Five of those went in the net.
Three: Know your foe – Well, the Kraken certainly know the Blues as that’s the last team to beat them. Nothing much has changed since that time other than the trade rumors for Blues centerman Robert Thomas continue to grow louder. Thomas didn’t face the Kraken last week as he was on a leave of absence related to a personal matter. He had a goal and an assist his first game back on Sunday in a win over Minnesota.
The Kraken didn’t face goalie Jordan Binnington the last time, either, as he was still fresh off the Winter Olympics for Canada. Joel Hoefer allowed one goal in beating them, then gave up just one in defeating the Wild so perhaps the Kraken would be best off facing trade rumor candidate Binnington this time around?
The Blues are anchored on defense by veteran Justin Faulk, another player surrounded by trade rumors, as well as 6-foot-4, 210-pound youngster Philip Broberg. They are the ones that tend to get a lot of pucks through to the opposing net for forwards to pounce on.
Projected lineup (not official):
McCann - Beniers - Eberle
Schwartz - Stephenson - Tolvanen
Catton - Wright - Kakko
Meyers - Gaudreau - Melanson
Dunn - Larsson
Oleksiak - Montour
Evans - Fleury
Daccord
