The Colorado Avalanche and St. Louis Blues meet Saturday in game 3 of the West Second Round NHL Playoffs at the Enterprise Center. The Colorado Avalanche look for a bounce back showing to take a 2-1 series lead. The St. Louis Blues look for back-to-back wins to take a surprising series lead.
The Colorado Avalanche are averaging 4.17 goals per game and are scoring on 38.1 percent of their power play opportunities. Nathan MacKinnon leads Colorado with 5 goals, Cale Makar has 7 assists and Valeri Nichushkin has 27 shots on goal. Defensively, the Colorado Avalanche are allowing 2.5 goals per game and are killing 68.8 percent of their opponent’s power plays. Darcy Kuemper has allowed 9 goals on 117 shots faced and Pavel Francouz has given up 5 goals on 51 shots.
The St. Louis Blues are averaging 3.5 goals per game and are scoring on 34.5 percent of their power play opportunities. David Perron leads St. Louis with 7 goals, Pavel Buchnevich has 6 assists, and Ryan O’Reilly has 29 shots on goal. Defensively, the St. Louis Blues are allowing 2.5 goals per game and are killing 82.8 percent of their opponent’s power plays. Ville Husso has given up 9 goals on 96 shots faced, and Jordan Binnington has allowed 9 goals on 173 shots.
The Avalanche are 55-18 in their last 73 games as a favorite and 49-18 in their last 67 overall. The Blues are 8-3 in their last 11 home games and 19-7 in their last 26 overall. The over is 5-2 in Avalanche last 7 games as a favorite. The over is 22-10-1 in Blues last 33 overall. The Avalanche are 5-2 in the last 7 meetings in St. Louis and 7-2 in the last 9 meetings.
The Colorado Avalanche should be favored because they’ve been the better team all season long, they’re still the favorites to win the title, and they’ve won 15 of the last 20 meetings against the Blues. With just one playoff loss, we shouldn’t be panicking for the Avs just yet. However, the St. Louis Blues have been in the thick of both games and now come home where they’ve won eight of their last 11 tries. The Blues have also won 19 of the last 27 meetings against the Avs at home. Jordan Binnington has been standing on his head all playoffs, and it gives the Blues a fighting chance in this series. I’ll take a shot at the plus money, as the Blues have shown they can hang in this series and do more damage than some previously thought.