Blues Postgame Show | 10/15/25

Blues Postgame Show | 10/15/25

[Music] Welcome in to our extended postgame coverage. The fourth period, it’s brought to you as always by First Community Credit Union. Skyly Heating Company and Urban Chestnuts Zwickle Light 83 the final score as the Blues fall to the Blackhawks tonight here at Enterprise Center along with Chris Kerver. I’m Alex Ferrario as we’ll break this one down a little bit long. I like how Curve showed up like uh like my dad does figuring out how FaceTime works. Tory, you’ve got the camera. I thought we were starting right then and there and then you jump in. Men are like, “Wait, am I stickers where you’ve got this thing set up? I come back to where my headsets are placed over here and like I’m I’m way in the back now on you.” You did the equivalent of when my parents FaceTime my daughters and they don’t know the camera’s on and it’s like this on my mom. I’m like, “Mom, back away from the phone. We can’t see you.” She pulls it away a little bit more and then we finally get to that one. Um, Curves, let’s I mean, a stinker of a game for this Blues team. You guys broke it down to perfection, but it to me, Curves, it just it felt like the team was just off altogether. And I think it might be just because of how the game was going and it was hard to get into the flow of things. I I look I there’s I think if you’re going to be kind of real fair, open, and honest about it, uh maybe one of the worst games from a goalender perspective. Yeah. honest to goodness on both sides actually, okay, than I can remember seeing in a long time. We’ve seen a a goalie struggle, maybe get pulled, other guy comes in, maybe the game kind of gets away. But on both side, I I mean, Soder Bloom was giving up weird goals tonight as well. But you know, unfortunately with the way the game started for Joel Hoffer, it was one of those games where sometimes the goalie, as we saw from the same goalender, we saw Joel Hoffer in Calgary, give the Blues a chance to find their game. And in the vast majority of games with both Hoofer and Bennington, the one thing that you can go back and and look at over the last few years, these two goenders have given the Blues a chance to find a way to win. Look, they they don’t have Martan Broaddor like numbers. Yeah. Okay. They’re But they’re especially Bennington like a fighting goalender that in the end you just want to be able to make the last save and and you don’t man you he’s that kind of goalender that doesn’t care if it’s a you know an an 87 win or a four nothing win. He wants to win and and and he’s got that in him. This is Joe Hoffer who is just playing in game number 71 I believe of his NHL career. He plays the puck well. Made a mistake on that first goal. All right. Blues recovered. The second goal just an unusual like I I don’t even I have to watch that one in so much slow motion to understand how that that back got through. That’s a from that angle with that size body of his on that post. That one shouldn’t go in. That’s two nothing. They came back and they made that one. But when Chicago made it three, right, that’s when doubt starts to creep into the game, you know, and and then and then when it was four, it was hard. So the Blues tried something in the second period. They tried to to at least see if they could change the game cuz you still felt like the Blues were in the game. You felt like ah like Sodboom clearly isn’t great tonight either. Yeah. Just if you can get the game going. So they tried putting Bennington in right off the bat. He faces a a a breakaway from Riel. Okay. And then Dickinson wires a shot, you know, that just gets underneath the bar. It’s five. So during the next during the intermission, they come back out with Hoffer. I heard Steve Steve hot say, “Okay, that’s when you just reset, go back to where you’re going, get the extra couple of days for Bennington, and then he goes against the Dallas Stars.” But to me, look, as as much and and we have, as much as we have praised what’s happened between the pipes, more times than not because it’s good, this was very honestly just a night where the goalending didn’t give you a chance to really get the game going. And you know that’s that that’s going to happen. I mean that’s going to happen. Nights like this that’s the most goals that Joel’s ever given up in a game. I mean the most was six which had only been one time one time in 70 games. I mean five I just kind of scrolling through might have happened five or six times you know in in in that stretch. So it just happens and and you know unfortunately in the game of hockey where goalending is that important you know that that that’s going to be the result there. Um so I don’t know if it would have made a difference. Probably not. Are you surprised that Monty didn’t call a timeout at all? No. No. No. Because there’s another aspect of this and and this is a good to me to me, you know, getting into the uh the sports psychology of the world, which we tend to do as we try to figure out what happened in a game like this where sometimes it’s just better to understand that every now and then there’s just chaos in the world. Go to bed and just watch the sun come up tomorrow. Okay. All right. Sometimes we don’t need an understanding. You’re just going to go Well, that was something else, right? Uh the the reality of it is is I do believe though that especially early in the season, teams have to find their way. And teams have to find their way on their own sometimes without the coach, right? And when this game was starting to get once it got to 42, you’re like, okay, who’s going to take it, right? Who’s going to do something? Now, we’re not in the locker room. We don’t know if anything was said. We don’t know who or what might have been said, if anything. Okay. But this is one of those games and I think Joe referenced it in the postgame show when he said, “Hey, I don’t know if you know this is one of those games where the coach sometimes doesn’t even go in and talk to the team after the game.” Right. Right. You let the players go there and figure it out. You know, uh when when Steve referenced a mandated off day in the CBA based on schedule and all that stuff, there’s a certain day. the days of a coach coaching staff being able to go, y’all were awful. Get, you know, there’s no her Brooks, get back out on the ice, right? Or come back in or over in that last CBA. And honestly, I’m fine with this cuz I mean, I have seen it go the other way. You know, you’ve get you might get one full day off here in a 10day window and I think it’s only like a I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s one a week or maybe just two a month. I can’t remember the exact CBA number, but you know, they’ll have plans with family with whatever and then a coach will throw a a curveball at it and it just messes things up. So, so part of the negotiation for the league to be able to get some of the business structure they want is stuff like mandated days off. That’s what’s going to happen tomorrow and in the end it is probably a positive for this team. But no, I think I think sometimes Alex like like Joel Hoffer’s got to battle through games like that too. Yeah. And I think that’s what they were trying to let him do. But then when that fourth goal went in they’re like all right we we still have a chance here in this game. I I think I think after the fifth goal that changed but you weren’t going to I don’t think they were going to totally keen the whole thing up and you know put Her right back in after that fifth goal. So um I I think it’s a growing game. I think guys like Mayu you know and different guys have to have to learn to go through something like that. How do they look themselves in the mirror? How do they say, “Hey, we got to be better.” You know, how does the leadership of the team help them, grab them, you know, do do that kind of thing? You know, I I love the fact that with 8 minutes to go in the game, Nathan Walker still hit Connor Badard. Yeah. You know, Jake Neighbor still leaving it all out there. It wasn’t pretty, you know, but there are, I think, some positive things in there. So, um, at least in terms of a couple of those guys. And like I said, I I I don’t know how you find a reason other than, you know, like you’re driving home and you look at the people you came to game with and go, “Well, beer was good.” What did you have? What you What did you drink tonight? That’s what the Annheiser Bush uh get that great chicken sandwich over there at the farm truck in the upper deck. Yeah. Okay, that was good. That’s what the fourth period’s for in the beer garden. Just go and forget about it down there. Grab my Steve’s hot dogs. I’m I’m I’m good. Good. I had a great I had a great loaded hot dog, you know, couple of terrific Budweisers and Yeah. All right. See you Saturday night, guys. We’re coming back. Happy hour starts at 5:30. So, I’ll I’ll wrap up with this one, Kirbs, because we’ll hear from Colton Perco and Braden Shen and Jim Montgomery on the other side as we’re in our Ted Drews three takeaways here with Chris Kerber. Uh you mentioned Mayu. We talked about him on BK and Ferrario today. I know there’s a lot of people in the comments section that are talking about Mayu. He actually played more minutes in this game than what he did versus Vancouver. I think he finished with about 12 and a half. Tonight he played 1549. Okay. Number one, how many of those were in the third period? That’s what I was pulling up as we’re talking. All right. That that’d be that’d be my first thing there. Look, I I think people have to calm down, right? I love the passion. I love the drive. I love the fire. I think this was game number 14 played eight. This was game number 12. Yes. Of his NHL career. Good math, Alex. Game 12. Okay, the Blues know that when they made that trade, they knew they were giving up a player in Zachary Bulldook that was coming off a good year, building confidence and developing to a good young NHL player. They also recognized something with Logan Mayu. They recognized size, the right-handed shot. Uh, clearly in the American Hockey League show a very good puck moving ability, right? This was game 12 in the best league in the world, right? And the only way you’re going to go through it is you’ve got to play some minutes. You can’t go through it playing eight minutes a game when you’re sitting there on the bench thinking, “Hey, I’m going to get a shift here. I’m going to get a shift there.” And then the coach sits down. That messes with you. I’m going to tell you quick story. Ian Cole Ian Cole is a great example of something here. All right. Ken Hitchcock had a certain style for whatever it was. Ken Hitchcock didn’t see something with Ian Cole. And Ian was one of those guys, he’d put him out there and if Ian made his mistake as a young defenseman, he’d be back on the bench. It messed with his mind a ton, right? And I’m going to give give a kind of there was one time where Ian Cole went in and requested a trade, you know, stayed off the public, you know, he kept it all in house. Like he was fantastic. Okay, they make the trade knowing that Ken Hitchcock isn’t going to play him much. They make a trade. They trade Ian Cole for Robert Bortuza. What does Ian Cole do? 24 minutes a game. 25 minutes a game. back-to-back Stanley Cups with the Pittsburgh Penguins. Right. And then becomes a soughtafter to veteran defenseman now as he’s been a journeyman towards the end of his career. Right. Look, young defenseman have got to be given the room to make mistakes and grow. And you know who know Mike Weber knows that as well as anybody. We were talking to him, Mike, in in Vancouver about, you know, his early days. He knows that. They recognize it. But to get there, you got to play. So, they’d like to see him playing 13, 14, 15 minutes a night. There’s going to be some games where you’re also going to protect. There may be some games where he’s sitting in the press box, right? At maybe Saturday night, maybe Matt Kessle gets an opportunity. I don’t know. Look, I do think and the reason I say that you have you see most teams at some point in time when you’ve got healthy players and he’s the one healthy player. Sunquist and Torpchenko. Now, they may be ready for Saturday, right? But you say, “Okay, he’s been out now. We haven’t played a game since his last preseason game. Let’s try to get him in. Where’s a good one? Okay, maybe there’s a chance to put him in there. We’ve seen plenty of rookies get put up into the press box for a while, you know, and and it happens, you know, from game to game. And then those are coaching moments, too. It allows them to catch their breath. This season comes at you fast. This season comes at you hard. And and so breathe and relax. Yeah. Right. And again, I’ve said this now. I think I said it on BK and Ferrario. said it uh to a couple other people when I’ve been asked today. Remember when the Blues traded Shanahan for Chris Pronger? The pressure that was on Chris Pronger because he was a high draft pick. People didn’t know much of him and he was a young defenseman trying to find his way in the league and you traded one of the franchise favorite players for him. I think he turned out okay. All right. Now look, if Logan Mayu develops, right, and turns into a solid top four guy, that doesn’t have to be Banner, you know, retired number caliber, but turns into that top four defenseman, that’s what the Blues were looking for with him, you know. So to me, relax, take it easy. It’s not a question I want to answer all season long. And I’m at some point I’m probably just going to look at you. We’ll be on BK Yogat next. Yep. Right. I’m with you. cuz this is it’s and it’s not not being a jerk about it. There’s just it’s just going to take some time. There’s not much else you can say. No, it’s going to take some time that you keep listening to keep in mind is yeah, there’s no doubt with the signing of Sudter and Bugstead and what Armstrong’s talked about they’ve sped the process up. Remember this was the year that Doug Armstrong initially said I thought this year would be the toughest. Last year’s results with the development too of Holloway and Broberg that showed that we’re in a different spot. But you still look at the gap defensively there, right? And where the prospects are defensively. Tyler Tucker is just in his second full season now in the National Hockey League, you know, let that one sink in there, you know, for a little bit as well. Uh, and then Broberg’s just over a hundred games played. Kessle still new from an experience standpoint, right? out of the eight defenseman or the seven defenseman that you have on the roster, that’s four of them that are whatever Broberg’s hundred something is or less, you know, so there’s there’s going to be some growing pains and times and and it’s going to mean your other defense are going to have to carry some of the load, you know, but that there was nothing tonight like this. I don’t think that I’m looking at any one guy, especially young guy in a scenario like like tonight. Yeah. you know that that that’s not how I look at and to your point on how Mike Weber’s viewing it with time on ice he played 530 in the first 519 in the second and 450 in the third right so pretty even even with the struggles that you may have gone through still an even amount of ice time and you’re seeing it in every single period now if I put on my Kelly Chase hat right if I put on my my Kelly Chase hat and I’m going to after 18 years of working with him I think I’m going to be pretty safe in this moment here Right. Known better than anybody else. Well, look, I mean, and this goes for Chicago, too. You know, I said it with Joe. I Nathan Walker hits your best player when you’re dominating the other team. I don’t care who you are on the ice. You go do something. Mhm. Right. It’s allowed in hockey. They don’t they don’t destroy you. They don’t suspend you. They just put you in the box for five minutes to catch your breath. Right. And look, I’m not I’ve never played that role. And and I’ve talked to plenty that do. I understand. I understand where they’re coming from in terms of, you know, the mental aspect that it takes. It’s it’s it’s hard. It’s not easy. I get it. But you’re a young upand cominging team. Did you have any of those guys in that second or third, have they learned from FelinO in the last couple of years? That’s when you want to see it. Yeah. At the same time, if you’re Tyler Tucker, if you’re if you’re Mayu, if you’re a young guy on this team, if you’re a young forward, you go and you stick your nose in, right, and see like you do what I mean, he caught him, right? Okay. If you get a free hit on Con, like the Blues hit Connor Bard pretty hard a couple times tonight, right? Blackhawks did nothing about it, right? That’s something that’s got to change. Yeah, that’s something that’s got to change in Chicago. Other teams are going to see that and they’re going to know that. And they knew with Felino out there, look at that lineup. Who’s going to do it? Well, nobody stepped up to do it, right? And again, sometimes you just got to stick your nose in. I thought there’s opportunity tonight for maybe some young guys to go, “Oh, the heck with this.” Yeah. You know, and I’m not saying do something stupid and two-handed guy across the mouth with your stick or something like that. But go and grab somebody. Take the instigator. Take the 2510. Do something. Take, you know, line that guy up. Hit. We saw a couple opportunities. I mean, the hitting from Nathan Walker, he threw a good check into Bertusi in there. You know, there’s other ways to kind of get your team going into the game a little bit. And and there’s youth on both of these teams that I honestly thought we probably could have seen some of that tonight. Well, they got a veteran team on Saturday. I take my chaser hat back off. It was a good chaser hat. Spot on with it. But you got a team that’s not afraid to do that in Dallas on Saturday. So, we’ll see what the uh Blues come out with against the Stars. Now look, that’s the other thing, too, is I I heard Jim Montgomery talk to the team at practice yesterday when we’re standing up where we watched the game and you could hear Jim. He warned the he warned his team about this team coming in tonight, right? Yeah. He warned what could happen, you know, and basically said, “Be ready for this.” Because they they watched the tapes. Joe referred to it tonight. You know, it’s there. No warning needs to come. The Dallas Stars have been a good team now for a little while and they’re bringing in somebody and if if the Chicago Blackhawks could do to this, you’re going home going, “Oh man.” Yeah. You know, I I Yeah. Yeah. It’s one of those eye opener games that get you ready for the rest of them. That That’s exactly right. Cuz the rest of this home stand is big. Dallas and then LA. Yeah. And then Utah. All Western Conference. All Western Conference games. Two Central Division games. Yeah. And And you know, I said it on on our offside hockey show on Matrix Midwest. I like you got to somehow you got to make sure you got to make sure that you’re keeping Colorado and Dallas or whoever ends up in those top two teams. Colorado already was seven points, right? A win tonight could have put you to six. Um Dallas in second place already with six points. Okay. Win could have had you tied with them in terms of points. You got to keep them close, right? you do not want to be, you know, you you don’t want to be shammed, you know, looking at Secretariat, you know, and like you’re not even getting dirty because they’re so far ahead that the dust is settled before you’re chasing them, you know, that kind of thing. So I I to me you’ve got to I I really think part of the early season, you know, from a fan watching standpoint, you want your horse close to these guys because you want to be closer to the pack there than in that mucky middle as this season goes along because at some point in time, the schedule is going to dictate play. The schedule is going to dictate fatigue. It’s going to dictate injuries. It’s going to dictate goending usage. It’s going to dictate penalties because you might be, you know, just a half second off and instead of your feet getting there, it’s a hooking penalty. It’s going to impact games. This early going while you still got energy and you’re not too beat up. You got to keep the horse close to the front of the pack. Yeah. Well, horse racing reference there at the end of a post game. Nails it. Kelly Chase hat. Horse racing reference. There we go. We’re primed to go for Saturday. Yep. Let’s go Churchill Downs, you know, and then we’ll go to uh we’ll go to the Pnessness. Hit the bell mount. We We got them all. We got them all lined up. All right, curves. Well, we’ll talk to you guys on Saturday night. Blues and stars. Sounds good. There you go. Voice of the Blues, Chris Gerber. Appreciate him sticking around. Our Ted Drews three takeaways. We’ll come back. We’ll hear from Jim Montgomery and a couple of players down in the Blues locker room after an 83 final score here on 101 ESPN. If you’re looking for your next home, think of First Community. Our Smart Choice Home Loan offers a 30-year fixed rate of just 6.531. Welcome back to the First Community Credit Union Blues Postgame Show presented by Scott Lee Heating Company and Urban Chestnut on 101 ESPN. It’s time to hear from the head coach Jim Montgomery presented by Fiser Window and Door Store. Offering quality Americanmade Marvin windows and doors, visit their showrooms in Brentwood or East Alton, Illinois. [Music] [Applause] Well, before we close it down tonight, we’ll have the final look by Pure Performance coming up in just a bit, but before we do that, let’s head down into the Blues locker room and hear from Jim Montgomery after tonight’s 8-3 loss. on in the first period, you know, we we showed good resolve, came back twice, and then uh just, you know, our habits um just weren’t consistent enough for to play winning hockey. Can’t give up that many oddman rushes. We can’t give up that many great A looks off the rush. You feel like that was the case after putting together the two games you put together in the row. Um yeah, you know, I thought that uh our game was building the right way uh in Vancouver. Um but our execution today uh did not match the Hawks execution. The goalenders would have been so good just an off night starting with hope. Yeah, I mean, you know, our tandem is excellent, you know, and um some nights you’re going to win games 2-1. Uh we won in Calgary, we won in Vancouver cuz our goalenders are excellent. Sometimes we need to win games 5-4. What was the the reasoning behind the timing of uh pulling hope in the second period there? I thought that we had lost our energy and I just wanted to try and see if we’d get a spark. And then the reasoning putting it back in there just let him finish the game out. Let him to finish the game out, you know, like see if something could happen, you know. Do you even say anything to him, you know, after, you know, difficulty gives him something that maybe they don’t or do you just leave him alone? I just leave him alone and during the game. Yeah. In particular, like when you see the way he’s handling the puck or maybe struggling with handling the puck, is that an indication that he’s not completely on his game? I I think that’s an indication for any player, you know, like if Yeah, your decision- making is not at the same level that you’re used to seeing it, you know, that um it could be an indication that a player’s not on his game. Do you think it was any case of uh after the two wins playing well, hey, we’ve got this thing figured out, we just play the game, you let down a little bit. No, I mean, we’re playing the Hawks, division rival, our biggest rival, and I I don’t think that was the case. I just we didn’t execute well, you know, and that that’s just our our mental sharpness was not great. And I know it’s easy to make the connection, but any reason you see about the way the teams played at home in the two years? Yeah, I I I think uh I you know, we’ll watch the tape, we’ll look back at it. Um, this game got away with us got away from us because of our own habits and actions. The the oddman rushes against is that just lack of connectivity with five guys or how does that Yeah, it’s you know reloads and gaps are a big part of how we want to play and the reloads were not consistent and that makes it hard on the defenseman. It’s time to take a look back at tonight’s game with a final look driven by Pure Performance. Only stop for all your aftermarket vehicle needs. So, our final look brought to you by Pure Performance. Going back to this one, and as Curbs and I broke down, just like Curbs and Joey broke down, it’s one you just move on from. But some numbers in this, it was just a rough night for your goalenders, rough night for goalending in general. and the Blackhawks just capitalized more than what the Blues did. You know, in terms of scoring chances, the Blues had their plenty of scoring chances. In fact, through the first two periods, the Blues were out uh performing the Blackhawks and scoring chances, but it was the oddman rushes and defensive zone turnovers that the Blues had most in both categories on, and it was an area that the Blues just really could not come back from. You know, I was curious because I do remember last year that the Blues went through this a couple of times where there was eight goals scored on them and I know I so the one that happened was the Washington Capitals on November 9th and that was two weeks after uh they had eight goals scored on them against the uh Ottawa Senators which was at the end of October, October 29th. Um and then we all know obviously what took place later on in November when Jim Montgomery was brought on and Drew Bannister was let go. But um couple of games back then that got to that and you heard Jim Montgomery mention it. You know, you get two on and one off and uh the routine, the uh the style, the identity that the Blues are searching for, uh just did not show up in this one tonight. And uh it’s an area that I know Doug Armstrong has talked about that in the past, you know, what gets frustrating are when games are close and then they get too far out of hand. Uh and that’s this one tonight. But I don’t know if it was just everybody as much as it was just a rough night for your goalenders. And you take it, you move forward and you expect your goalending tandem, which has been so good for the Blues over the last few years uh right the ship when they take on a team like the Dallas Stars. But it’s a tough matchup and as the uh teams in the Central Division continue to win, you don’t want to get too far behind in this Western Conference because of course the Blackhawks win tonight, the Mammoth won against the uh Calgary Flames. So, you have to keep pace in the Western Conference. Good news though, three more games against these Western Conference teams on home ice. Dallas and then LA and then Utah. That game on Saturday against the Stars 6:00 with a pregame skate starting at 5:00 all right here on your home for the Blues 101 ESPN. Once again, a big thank you to Jim Huer for our help up at the broadcast booth. Jordan Deacon down in the Blues locker room and then of course Grant Francis back in our network studios. I’m Alex Ferrario. Blues fall to the Blackhawks 8 to3. Let’s all do ourselves a favor and just forget this one ever happened. And we’ll talk to you on Saturday for Blues and Stars right here on your home for the Blues 101 ESPN.

The Blues suffer an 8-3 beatdown by the Blackhawks.