In St Louis, the Blues needed a win to clinch the Central Division and they did just that with a 2-1 win over the Chicago Blackhawks Thursday.
“We’ve come from a long ways back to catch Nashville,” Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said. “It looks like it’s going to be the toughest division in hockey for a lot of years now. Getting in the playoffs, winning the division, getting home ice is … any advantage you 
can get is going to be really important.
“I think we played some of our best hockey. We’ve missed some of our good players to injury (forwards Alexander Steen and Vladimir Tarasenko), but we had to change the way we played and we had to really get our grind on and we did it. We had to adjust; we couldn’t play the way we did before based on personnel. Guys deserve a lot of credit for being able to adjust on the fly. We had no practices, one hockey practice in changing the way we had to play, and we did a good job with it.”
The Predators had held the top spot for most of the season but a spring swoon left the door open for someone else.
“We battled,” Blues defenseman Alex Pietrangelo said. “We had a little slip-up there a week and a half, two weeks ago, but the character we’ve showed, guys missing with injuries, that’s the type of guys we have in this dressing room.
“… It’s a good feeling. It’s a long year. We accomplished a lot this year. We’ve still got to try and clinch home ice advantage on Saturday for the rest of the playoffs. We’ve still got a lot to play for.”
Meanwhile the Hawks have a swoon of their own going with their third straight loss in the absence of offense.
“The last three games have been close,” Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews said. “It just seems to be breakdowns and rushes against at a certain point in the third period that ends up hurting us, so I guess that is the case when you’re down a goal. We’ve got to make plays in the offensive zone, which we didn’t do a whole lot tonight. It was a tough one tonight, but you keep playing well, keep building and keep preparing for the postseason.”
In Sunrise, th3e Florida Panthers exacted a bit of revenge on the Boston Bruins but hanging a 4-2 loss on the B’s.
The Bruins are now on the outside looking in thanks to the Ottawa Senators’ 3-0 win over the New York Rangers.
“It’s tough,” Bruins center Chris Kelly said. “We’ve been a proud group that’s always wanted to do things on our own and we’re looking for help.”
Roberto Luongo stopped 34 for the win.
“It’s not sweet because we’re still not in the playoffs,” Luongo said.”But they did it to us last week (a 3-2 Boston win March 31). It was a heartbreaker so it was nice to return the favor. But we’re still on the outside looking in. We’ll take it and get ready for the last one and move on.”
But just not as bitter as maybe it had been.
“We shoot ourselves in the foot and we’ve put ourselves in this position now that you have to win the next game, no ifs or buts, and you have to hope you get some help,” Bruins coach Claude Julien said. “We were hoping we wouldn’t be in that position where you rely on others. Right now, we are. …We have to look at ourselves, nobody else.”
In Nashville, there was a Darcy Kuemper sighting as Devan Dubnyk was given the night off by the Minnesota Wild. The Wild did not miss a beat in rallying past the Predators for a 4-2 win.
“Gutsy effort tonight,” Kuemper said. “We’ve been doing good on the road lately; [the win tonight] tied the record I’m pretty sure. We had a lot of guys out tonight, and everyone just kind of stepped up, and we stuck with it right to the end. Early deficit, and we just kind of chipped away at it.”
It was the Wild’s 12 straight road win, tying an NHL record.
“For sure you do,” Minnesota coach Mike Yeo said. “I think it’s a really cool thing that we tied it.
“I know it doesn’t sound like much, and it’s only two points, but I think there’s a big difference between 98 and 100 points. When you get over the 100-point plateau, I think that’s a mark of a really good hockey team. That meant something to us, but I think [breaking the record would] be something special for sure.”
Jason Zucker had two goals in the win.
“A lot of lines were different, a lot of combinations were different, guys not used to playing with each other,” Zucker said. “I think we were better as the game went on. We controlled more of the play in the second period. Guys kind of calmed down and made more plays.”
Nashville had taken a 2-0 lead but then seemed to relax giving the Wild the opportunity to rally.
“After we went up 2-0, they battled harder than we did,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “For the next 35 minutes until the beginning of the third period, where we had lots of opportunities and looks in the third period to try and win a hockey game, but you’re rolling the dice. We cruised for 35 minutes. It was not good enough. We’re trying to win a hockey game in the last 20; we need to play a full 60.”
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