How can the blues create NHL playoffs? A daily look at what must happen

St. Louis – Everything could come to the game n. 82 – and perhaps beyond – for St. Louis Blues.

The Blues got an extraordinary position to make the NHL playoffs with a 12 -games winning series. But that’s right, they are in three games losing Skid after a 4-3 defeat against Seattle’s Kraken Saturday. While their possibilities to advance are still in some way favorable, they go down IFS AND And.

The blues are sitting in the second point Jolly in the western conference with 94 points, while Calgary’s flames breathe along the back with 90 points and two games in hand.

There will be many scores who look at the next two days.

Here is a daily look …

Sunday: The blues are in the playoffs if the flames lose the San Jose sharks in the regulation. If the flames win in the regulation, the race continues.

Monday: Both teams are out.

Tuesday: The blues host the Utah Hockey Club in their last game of the regular season and are with a victory in regulation. In the meantime, the flames host the Golden Knights of Las Vegas and Drop is about an hour later. If the blues lose in the regulation and the flames win in the regulation, the race continues.

Wednesday: The blues can only wait and wonder while the flames are off.

Thursday: The flames will travel to the Kings for their last game of the regular season. If the flames win in the regulation – which means that they have won the last three games in the regulation – then they will take the playoff. This is because a non-adjustment victory for the blues on Utah and three regulatory victories by the flames would give them the first tiebreaker on the blues (32-31).

All this could have been very different if the blues had not given up a goal to the Edmonton Oilers with 20 seconds left in the regulation on Wednesday, costing them the extraordinary point or if they had not fallen to Lomly Seattle. But that’s where they are and after needing a series of franchise victories to get here, they take it.

“You have to take points and we didn’t take a point the last game (against Edmonton),” said the Blues coach Jim Montgomery. “If we had grabbed a peak point, we would have been in good shape. But we are still in good shape – we control our destiny.

“After the 4 nations (face-off), if someone said that we could win our last game of the year and we do the playoffs, we would all take it. So, we are in a nice place due to the effort we have made in the last two months.”

The blues earn a point but fall to the Kraken in the shooting. #stlblues pic.twitter.com/rssvisgyjy

– St. Louis Blues (@stlouisblues) April 13, 2025

It is right, but the blues have not resembled anything close to what they seemed during their series of victories in 12 games.

For a team that passed its opponents 33-14 to five out of five during the series, the difference has only been 8-6 in the last three games.

In the 3-1 defeat of the Blues against the Winnipeg Jets on Monday, they had three shots on the door in the first period and closed with 15 (drawn for a minimum of the season). In the defeat in Seattle on Saturday, they also had only three shots in the first period and closed with 23.

“I just think we were a little tight to start the game (Saturday) for any reason, but we loosened,” Montgomery said. “I thought that our second period, the first five minutes, started seeing the blues hockey and the entire third period.”

But overall, the offense seemed to be disconnected, and it is clear how much the team miss the striker Dylan Holloway, who is outside the week in the week with an injury to the lower body and is not skating.

Montgomery had no other choice than mixing his line combinations and changing them in the game. At the end of Saturday’s match, he had Jake Neighbors, Robert Thomas and Jordan Kyrou together, together with Pavel Buchnevich, Brayden Schenn and Jimmy Snugggerud.

It is essential that the blues find a little rhythm without Holloway because his injury could keep him out for the first round of the playoffs – if they qualify – and potentially longer.

While they continue to play without Holloway, on Saturday they returned an injured player: Colton Parayko.

The defender was a surprise addition to training. Montgomery had said that Parayko was doubtful for the match against Seattle and that Tuesday’s match against Utah was a target date for his possible return from a scope of the knee.

But after Parayko has lost the last 17 games, in which the blues went a shocking 13-3-1, he returned.

“I built the last week,” said Parayko. “It was nice, where you turn the corner and use the practice to improve.

Parayko played 23:21 and, in addition to scoring his 16th goal of the season, blocked five shots at the team level.

“It seemed really good,” said Montgomery. “It seems that he is ready to be inclinable again.”

It is Baaack 👀 #stlblues pic.twitter.com/ucbn6ye5yw

– St. Louis Blues (@stlouisblues) April 13, 2025

The blues did not have their full arsenal in defense, however, since Philip Broberg lost the game after returning home for personal reasons. It is not known if it will be available for Tuesday’s match.

But with or without Broberg, the blues feel good after a third period in Seattle who may have been the best of the trip to three games.

“I think, looking at this game, I think we got that swagger in the third period,” said Blues Nick Leddy’s defender, which he scored in the third period. “This is how we were playing during that series of victories, and we can see how effective it is. If you look back a few weeks ago and you saw where we were then and now, we will definitely take it all day.”

The blues do not have such a good chance in the Jolly point n. 1 like a few days ago.

Minnesota Wild beat Vancouver Canucks, 3-2 in extraordinary Saturday after following 2-0. The savages play their last game of the regular season against Anaheim Ducks Tuesday at home. Minnesota will protect the best Wild Cards with one point, or if the blues get only one point or loses in the regulation of their game on Tuesday.

But as far as it winds in the post -station, the blues still have control.

“The group has done an excellent job in the last month and a little here,” said Parayko. “Win and we are inside. He is in our field. Come here and put our foot forward and give us a good chance to enter the playoffs.”

If the blues do not advance following the result of Flames-Sharks Sunday, Montgomery is not worried about the pressure that his players will face Tuesday.

“If you are immersed at the moment and you are thinking about what you can check, which is your next round, then you don’t even feel the pressure,” Montgomery said. “This is accepted opportunity, and that’s how we are looking at it.”

(Photo by Colton Parayko: Rio Giancarlo / Getty Images)