Blues struggle in round-robin, will be No. 4 seed in Stanley Cup Playoffs

The St. Louis Blues entered the round-robin portion of the Stanley Cup Qualifiers as the top team in the Western Conference but will be the No. 4 seed in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

The defending Stanley Cup champions finished 0-2-1 in the round-robin following a 2-1 shootout loss against the Dallas Stars on Sunday and will play the Vancouver Canucks (No. 5) in the best-of-7 Western Conference First Round at Rogers Place in Edmonton, the West hub city. The No. 3 Stars will play play the No. 6 Calgary Flames.

The Blues were 1-1-1 against the Canucks in the regular season. Game 1 is Wednesday (10:30 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS).

"I'm not going to sit here and worry about what seed we are. I'm worried about Vancouver, that's who we play," Blues coach Craig Berube said. "We've got to play better as a team. That's what's on my mind, getting my team to play Vancouver, and we have to play better than we're playing."

St. Louis (42-19-10, .662 points percentage) struggled throughout the round-robin tournament and took 17 penalties over the three games.

"We have to be more disciplined," Blues forward Robert Thomas said. "I took a bad (penalty in the first period). When you're moving our feet, you're not taking lazy penalties. We know they're calling them; every game has had a lot of them. It's just about discipline and being smart."

The Blues also couldn't hold a late lead and were outscored 6-0 in the third period of their games against the Colorado Avalanche (2-1 loss), Vegas Golden Knights (6-4 loss) and Stars. Dallas forward Joe Pavelski scored with 37 seconds remaining in the third period to force overtime before forward Denis Gurianov scored in the shootout.

"I don't think we're playing well in the third, that's one thing," Berube said. "We didn't make one play tonight and we didn't in the other two games either. We're almost trying to win with a one-goal lead. We're not trying to get the next goal, we're not playing aggressive. When you give the puck back to the other team, chances are they're going to get a goal."

Blues goalie Jake Allen, who saved 24 of 25 shots against the Stars, said his team improved as the round-robin went along.

"We didn't play our best, but I think we've progressively gotten better," he said. "We need to take these next couple of games and hone in on Vancouver. It's going to be a good challenge for us."

After falling to the No. 4 seed for the playoffs the Blues are focused on improving in all facets, which will be imperative when the first round gets underway.

"It's obviously a little bit disappointing, but for us it was about finding our game, and we started to find it there today and just have to keep building it," Thomas said. "We've shown and we're confident that when we play our game and play the way we want to, we're a tough team to beat. So, I think that's the biggest thing.

"If we get going, there's a lot of teams that are going to have trouble with us."