SEATTLE — In a bid for the St. Louis Blues’ first goal of the 2024-25 season, Jordan Kyrou hit a post in the first period of Tuesday’s game against the Seattle Kraken.
If you were thinking Kyrou was on his way to another snake-bitten start to the year, you weren’t alone. He clanked iron a couple of times and couldn’t convert a few breakaways early in the 2023-24 season, and one month into the year, he was sitting on just two goals.
But after hitting that post Tuesday, Kyrou found the back of the net. Just one game into this year, he’s already sitting on two goals.
“Yeah, he took advantage of opportunities,” Blues coach Drew Bannister said. “There were a couple opportunities where I’d like to see him bear down (more). But he’s finding areas, guys were finding him, he’s using his speed, he’s competing and good things happen when he’s doing that.”
Kyrou should have gained some early confidence in the Blues’ 3-2 come-from-behind win over Seattle. He had three official shot attempts and directed seven pucks at the net.
His first goal came via a designed play on the power play.
The Blues noticed in the pre-scout that a quick-up to Kyrou could work. Defenseman Justin Faulk had the puck in the neutral zone and sent it all the way back to Robert Thomas in the defensive zone. Thomas took a couple of strides with the puck and then fired it back up to Kyrou at the offensive blue line, where he built up some speed skating into the zone and beat Kraken goalie Philipp Grubauer with a backhander for a 2-1 deficit.
“Yeah, it was just a little set breakout, and I had the step,” Kyrou said. “Thomer made a nice little fake to the middle and hit me wide.”
Our first goal of the season is this absolute beauty. #stlblues pic.twitter.com/5fe1MLiMBz
— St. Louis Blues (@StLouisBlues) October 8, 2024
Newcomer Philip Broberg tied the score 2-2, then Kyrou scored the Blues’ third goal in a span of 1 minute, 55 seconds to put them ahead. This time, he helped create a turnover, in which Alexandre Texier put him on a breakaway and he finished it up with a wrist shot past Grubauer.
“He was on his toes,” Bannister said. “He jumped on the (faceoff) loss, broke up the play, (Texier) got a hold of the puck and sent (Kyrou) off. It was good stuff.”
Kyrou shook off the success like he shook off the Seattle defense.
“Fresh start to the season, new year, so feeling good,” he said.
Here’s what else we learned …
When the power play’s on, five-on-five offense follows
If the Blues’ power play can produce in the top half of the NHL this season, it can bring the offensive players so much more momentum. The Blues went a stretch of 10:42 in the first period without a shot on goal. But once Kyrou scored on the power play in the second period, it was off: a three-goal scoring spree in a stretch of four shots.
“Early in the year, the confidence, I think it goes a long way with our group,” Bannister said.
The Blues rarely won the special-teams battle last season, but Tuesday they were 1-2 on the power play and 1-1 on the penalty kill.
Soon the Blues are going to be forced to make some lineup decisions with their forward group. It could come when Brandon Saad returns from paternity leave or when Oskar Sundqvist is back from rehabbing his surgically repaired knee.
When this happens, if there’s any way the Blues can keep Nathan Walker in the lineup, they have to figure it out. He may have single-handedly changed the direction of Tuesday’s game in the second period — after a Kraken goal was disallowed because the play was offside, Walker confronted former Blue Vince Dunn near the bench.
“We just kind of ran into each other,” Walker said afterward with a smirk. “Our paths crossed and that was kind of it. I just felt we were a little flat so I thought I’d stir it up a bit and get us some energy.”
That started a bit a brouhaha between the team, in which matching fighting majors and roughing penalties were handed out. From that point on, the Blues had 10 of the next 13 shots on goal and scored three times to take a 3-2 lead.
“Here’s a guy who continually finds ways to keep himself in the lineup to make a difference,” Bannister said. “He did it tonight. It might not have been on the scoresheet, but he found a way.”
Alexey Toropchenko vs Yanni Gourde from the St Louis Blues at Seattle Kraken game on Oct 8, 2024 https://t.co/VHslIpbEaD
— hockeyfights (@hockeyfights) October 8, 2024
There’s work to do defensively
There were times Tuesday where each of the Blues’ six defensemen had tough moments. Colton Parayko was indecisive in the neutral zone on a sequence that led to a Seattle goal. Ryan Suter lost coverage on front of the net on the other Kraken goal. There were other issues and overall, the group got hemmed in a lot, especially in the first period.
But when it mattered, when the Blues were clinging to a 3-2 lead in the third period, Seattle had just four shots on goal in the period and not a single one in the final 11:50.
“I think the whole third period, we were really good,” Bannister said. “The shots they got were probably on the power play. After that, there were limited chances. We supported the puck well, we were pretty good on the walls, our D got back to pucks and we forced them to play from their goal-line back. We were able to get in on the forecheck and we created some good offensive opportunities, where their goalie had to make some pretty difficult saves.”
There was enough credit to go around after the Blues’ win Tuesday — Kyrou, Walker, etc. — but it doesn’t happen without Binnington in net. The fact they were trailing just 2-0 in the second period was somewhat shocking, as the Kraken had a 71.6 percent of the five-on-five goal share and a 20-4 advantage in high-danger chances through the first two periods.
“Binner was outstanding early on when we weren’t at our best,” Bannister said. “We had to rely on him early to keep that game close, and I thought he did that well for us. The guys rallied for him, and we found a way to win a hockey game for him.”
Binnington finished with 30 saves for his 146th career win as a Blue. He’s now just five wins shy of tying Mike Liut, who is now Binnington’s agent, for No. 1 on the franchise’s all-time list.
Zack Bolduc is back
If you saw that Zack Bolduc was recalled from AHL Springfield Tuesday and rejoined the Blues, there’s an explanation, albeit a semi-complicated one.
The Blues had to submit a salary-cap compliant roster by 4 p.m. CT Monday. Their goal was to come as close to the NHL’s $88 million cap ceiling because the closer they are, the more they can use of a player’s salary when they’re placed on Long-Term Injured Reserve (LTIR).
So the Blues submitted an opening-day roster that was approximately $500,000 below the $88 million ceiling. Then when they placed defenseman Torey Krug and his $6.5 million cap hit on LTIR Tuesday, it now allows them to exceed the cap by $6 million.
In the meantime, the Blues could not afford to have Bolduc on the opening-day roster because of his $1.276 million cap hit. However, he was already in Seattle with the team and in fact never left. He actually took pre-game warmups with the team Tuesday and was eligible to play if they needed him, but as it turned out, he was a healthy scratch.
After submitting opening roster $468K under cap, #Stlblues put Krug to LTIR, allowing them to exceed cap by $6.03M.
Then called up Bolduc, who uses $1.276M space due to his perf bonuses not included in initial LTI capture.
Have $5.2M space remaininghttps://t.co/ngpfL9Qi6B
— PuckPedia (@PuckPedia) October 8, 2024
(Photo of Jordan Kyrou celebrating a goal: Steph Chambers / Getty Images)
