Blues force Game 7 with another blowout win vs. Jets

Tom Timmermann, St. Louis Post-Dispatch on May 2, 2025

Published in Hockey

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ST. LOUIS — The Blues continued to be kings of their own domain, clobbering the Winnipeg Jets at the Enterprise Center for the third time in their first-round series, winning Game 6 5-2 on Friday night and sending the series back to Manitoba for Game 7 on Sunday. That game will start at 6 p.m.

The Blues tied the series at 3-3 with a blast of four goals in 5:23 in the second period that broke a tight game wide open. It was an unlikely cast of scorers for the Blues: defensemen Philip Broberg and Cam Fowler, fourth-liners Nathan Walker and Alexey Toropchenko, and Brayden Schenn.

In the three games of the series in St. Louis, the Blues outscored Winnipeg 17-5 and chased goalie Connor Hellebuyck, the likely Vezina Trophy winner as the league’s top goalie, out of the game in all three of them. It’s the seventh straight road game where Hellebuyck has allowed four or more goals.

But the Blues have yet to figure out how to win in Winnipeg, where the Presidents' Trophy-winning Jets won Games 1, 2 and 5. While those games have been tighter, the Blues have been the second-best team in all of them. But while there were two off days between Games 4 and 5, there’s just one day between Games 6 and 7, and less time to regroup.

Winnipeg threatened at times in the second period and Jordan Binnington had to make some good saves to protect the lead. Tempers flared early in the third period, with five players getting roughing penalties in one skirmish. That was the first of several interactions between the teams in the final period, as the penalty boxes began to overflow with players.

The winner of this series will play either Colorado or Dallas, who play Game 7 of their series on Saturday night.

Blowing the game open

Winnipeg looked to have tied the game just 29 seconds into the second period when Justin Faulk put an attempted clearance pass right on the stick of Winnipeg’s Morgan Barron, who came in on Binnington and scored. But the Blues challenged for offside, and it wasn’t hard because Mason Appleton was well offside on the play.

But that only lasted so long. With Nathan Walker off for slashing, Winnipeg needed just 12 seconds with the man advantage, with Cole Perfetti’s attempt to put the puck in front of the net coming right back to him, and he was able to stuff the puck in with 14:17 to go in the period.

And then came 5 minutes and 23 seconds that blew the game wide open. First it was Walker, scoring his third goal in two games, scoring once again from in front of the net. Fifty-two seconds later, Schenn scored from the top of the right circle to make it 3-1.

With 6:20 to go, Fowler scored his second of the series, from the top of the circles through traffic, giving the Blues three goals in 2:06. And then, with 3:03 to go, Toropchenko gave the fourth line another goal to make it 5-1.

Winnipeg coach Scott Arniel didn’t lift Hellebuyck at that point, to the surprise of many. But when the teams came out for the third period, it was Eric Comrie in goal for the Jets, with Hellebuyck staying behind in the dressing room.

Broberg puts Blues ahead

Winnipeg had most of the puck to start the game, but the Blues scored first, on a goal by Broberg with 13:55 to go in the first. Jimmy Snuggerud brought the puck behind the net to Robert Thomas, who fed Broberg high between the circles for a one-timer that he didn’t get every thing on but still beat Hellebuyck.

Buchnevich was in the crease ahead of the shot and was pushed out of the way by Winnipeg’s Dylan Samberg, but in doing so it was Samberg that screened Hellebuyck on the shot. Winnipeg used its timeout to scrutinize the replay and decide whether to challenge for goalie interference, but ultimately decided against it.

The Blues had a power play 32 seconds later that produced nothing, and then Winnipeg got one that the Blues did a very good job of killing. From there, the Blues took control of the period, and looked to have scored about with about 2:20 to go on a power play. Zack Bolduc took a shot that Hellebuyck saved and the puck came to Snuggerud on Hellebuyck’s right with an open net, but the goalie was able to get back across the goal mouth to get his stick on Snuggerud’s shot.

Winnipeg had just two shots on goal in the first period.

Rearranging

The Blues made one change, with Mathieu Joseph going in for Alexandre Texier, but there was a lot of movement for the Jets. With Mark Scheifele out after getting hurt in Game 5 and Nikolaj Ehlers returning to the lineup from an injury, every line was different for the Jets.

"We’ve had to do it all year," Arniel said, "so it isn’t something like we’ve been able to roll perfectly through an 82-game schedule. Guys have been asked to take on these bigger roles. That’s professional hockey players. they want to be challenged and if they get that opportunity, they want to take advantage of it. that’s what I like best is that guys have jumped into roles and succeeded and you hope when those times come, they do."