In St Louis, the Blues got a strong effort from Jordan Binnington, who made 28 saves, in a 5-2 win over the Minnesota Wild in Game 4 on Sunday afternoon.
It was Binnington’s first post season win since the Stanley Cup Final in 2019.
“It felt good, I felt prepared,” Binnington said. “We had a good start to the game, a really good first period. Definitely a big win, a hard-fought win. We had guys step in the lineup, but I felt pretty good.
“Definitely I had to be patient. Nothing this morning, wait for the game, just hanging out at home and just prepping.”
The win even the series at 2-2,
“They’re a great team. They’re hard to play against,” Blues coach Craig Berube said of the Wild. “They do a good job, and we’re a good team too, so here we are. We’re tied.”
Game 5 is in St Paul on Tuesday.
“We just felt we got disrupted a little early in the game, obviously, with [a] four-minute (minor to Kevin Fiala at 8:42 of the first period) and … then another high stick (on Joel Eriksson Ek) and then 4-on-4, so, the first period, we wanted to get to our game, and we weren’t able to get to our game because of that,” Wild coach Dean Evason said.
“But having said that, we’ve got to stay out of the box too. It disrupted everything. … It disrupts the flow of the game, disrupts what we want to do, what we want to get to, 5-on-5, right? But having said that, we have to find a way to get to it. We did get momentum from those kills. So, we didn’t do enough to get to our game, but [the penalties] hurt us early as well.”
Jordan Kyrou hit for a double in the win.
Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy were the Wild strikers.
“Yeah, it’s definitely nice to get the first goal,” Kyrou said. “It’s a huge confidence builder for the team, especially here at home. The crowd was unbelievable tonight and it definitely got us going.”
David Perron also struck for a pair of goals for St Louis.
“Obviously, you want to come out hot and come out strong,” Kyrou said. “We did that today and we should continue to do it all series long.”
The Blues’ Ryan O’Reilly added a single marker and added two assists in the victory.
Marc-Andre Fleury made 29 saves in the Wild loss.
“Well, the vibe right now, of course, when we lose a game is not the best,” the Wild ‘sFrederick Gaudreau said. “The vibe is, it’s 2-2. Like we said earlier, it’s not going to be easy, it’s the playoffs, and the Blues are a good team.”
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