ST. LOUIS — Jordan Binnington heard the roar, but the St. Louis Blues goaltender didn’t know what all the commotion was about.
Early in the Blues’ game against the Los Angeles Kings on Wednesday night, Roman Bürki, St. Louis’ other wildly talented and popular goalie, was shown on the video board at Enterprise Center, and the applause from the sellout crowd of 18,096 rose to a crescendo.
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Bürki played the position masterfully for St. Louis City of Major League Soccer in the club’s inaugural season last year, with Binnington in the stands to watch, and now Bürki was in attendance for a Blues game.
“He’s a legend already,” Binnington said of the reaction Bürki received from fans.
Binnington, of course, became a St. Louis legend in 2019 when he backstopped the Blues to the Stanley Cup, and he added to that status Wednesday with 40 saves in a 3-1 victory over the Kings.
Blues 🤝 @stlcitysc
Having great keepers. pic.twitter.com/MZkeC9HSvs
— St. Louis Blues (@StLouisBlues) March 14, 2024
It was the second time in Binnington’s last four games that he finished with 40-plus saves. He would’ve had his second shutout in his past eight appearances, which would’ve tied him with Glenn Hall for fourth in franchise history with 16, but a late goal by L.A.’s Adrian Kempe spoiled that.
Whether you were Bürki or a Blues teammate watching it for the umpteenth time this season, you had to be impressed.
“I’ve said this a bunch this year: As a new guy to this team, he’s the most surprising guy, in my mind. How hard he works, how good he is, how good he is in practice and just how he goes about his everyday life,” said Blues center Kevin Hayes, who’s in his first season with the club. “He’s been our best player all year. He pretty much keeps us in every game every night.”
Binnington improved to 23-18-3 with a 2.82 goals-against average and a .913 save percentage this season. It was win No. 140 in his career, which is third all time for the Blues behind No. 1 Mike Liut (151) and Jake Allen (148).
Binnington recently passed Curtis Joseph (137), a goalie who was a role model of his growing up in Toronto. Well, with the Blues wearing their retro jerseys against the Kings — the same ones worn by Joseph in the 1990s — Binnington looked a lot like “Cujo.”
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“I have the Cujo helmet sitting at home,” he said. “If I knew we were in these jerseys today, I probably should’ve brought it. It’s still sitting there in the bar, waiting to get used.”
There were side-to-side saves, diving saves, pokecheck saves and saves without his stick, and none were better than the sequence midway through the third period when Binnington made a desperation left-leg save on L.A.’s Mikey Anderson and, five seconds later, another on Drew Doughty with his mask.
“That was kind of a free-for-all moment,” Binnington said. “That’s the old road hockey, mini-stick goalie coming out of you.”
WHAT A SAVE BY BINNINGTON 😱 pic.twitter.com/wECDi8B4V9
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) March 14, 2024
Maybe not to that level, but Binnington has made a lot of incredible saves this season. Are the Blues getting used to them?
“I don’t think you get used to that,” Blues coach Drew Bannister said. “It shows our level of compete that you need to have if you want to win hockey games.”
With the victory Wednesday, the Blues (71 points) pulled to within 6 points of the Vegas Golden Knights (77) in the Western Conference wild-card race. And, keep in mind, they’re also 6 points behind the Kings (77). That’s important because the Kings sit in third place in the Pacific Division, but if they were to fall out of the top three in their division, that’s who the Blues could be battling for a wild-card spot.
The Blues have played one more game than Vegas and L.A. this season.
“It makes things interesting, and it starts to put a little heat on the teams that are in front of us,” Bannister said. “You can feel after the Boston game that we had struggled to find a good feeling in our room, and after that Boston game, it seemed that we were starting to get it back. But we have to continue to work to keep that feeling.”
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The Blues are off until the weekend, when they host the Minnesota Wild and Anaheim Ducks on Saturday and Sunday, and they wrap up their four-game homestand Tuesday against the Colorado Avalanche.
“That’s the best part of hockey is playing meaningful games, whether that’s late in the season or the playoffs,” said Hayes, who has 3 points in his last two games. “If you don’t get amped up for these games, every game’s kind of do-or-die at the moment.”
The Blues have 16 games remaining — 10 at home and six on the road — and they have a combined record of 17-10-2 against the opponents.
Remaining schedule
(Head-to-head records from this season and home games in white)
| Team | Head to head |
|---|---|
1-1 | |
1-0 | |
1-2 | |
1-0 | |
1-1 | |
1-1 | |
2-0 | |
0-1 | |
1-0-1 | |
0-2 | |
0-1 | |
1-0 | |
2-1 | |
1-0 | |
2-0 | |
2-0-1 |
For the Blues to have a shot at the playoffs, they’ll have to reel off a sizable winning streak, which has been hard to come by this season. Their longest was five consecutive games, followed by three in a row, which they’ve done just twice.
“We’ve got more work to do,” Binnington said. “We’ve put ourselves in a position here to create a new story and find a way in. We believe in this locker room that if you get there, anything can happen.”
If the Blues can somehow sneak into the playoffs, the old saying goes that a goalie like Binnington could steal them a series. He was asked late Wednesday night what it’s like to hear people say that.
“Yeah, I enjoy that time of year,” he said. “No one player wins a playoff series. It’s a whole gang. It’s why we play, to get to those moments, right? We’re really hoping we can get there.”
In front of St. Louis’ other remarkable goalie, Bürki, Binnington’s performance in the net Wednesday kept the Blues going in the right direction.
“It’s a privilege and an honor to be in that position,” he said. “Like I keep saying, I’m enjoying these moments and able to be present and focused on the here and now. We can feel it. We were playing a team (L.A.) that we’re going up against (in the standings), so that’s a big 2- or 4-point game, however you want to look at it. But it’s all about that next one.”
(Photo: Jeff Curry / USA Today)