The Blues know exactly what they'll need from their final game of the season in order to make the playoffs after a 4-1 win over the Blackhawks at United Center in Chicago on Friday night.
The Blues snapped a four-game losing streak and jumped back into the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference with the win. They are one point up on Colorado with one game to play. The teams meet at the Pepsi Center in Denver on Saturday.
The win means the Blues will go to the playoffs for the seventh consecutive season if they can beat the Avalanche in any manner or take the game to overtime and earn a point. If that happens, the Blues and Avalanche would be even on points, even on the first tiebreaker of regulation and overtime wins, but the Blues would have gotten five points to Colorado's four this season. (The first meeting of the season in St. Louis doesn't count for tiebreaking purposes since the teams played an odd number of games.)
The Blues got a hat trick from Patrik Berglund, his second goal coming 16 seconds after Chicago had tied the game in the third period at 1. Robert Bortuzzo took a shot from the point that hit Kyle Brodziak and Berglund swatted in the rebound. He had the game's first goal, in the first period, when he tipped in a shot by Joel Edmundson that crossed up Chicago goalie J-F Berube. Berglund has nine goals in the 16 games since he was a healthy scratch on Feb. 28 when coach Mike Yeo was dissatisfied with the veteran forward's play. His third goal was into an empty net with 1:11 to play. It was his second career hat trick.
Jaden Schwartz got a clinching goal for the Blues with 7:20 to play, finishing off a pass from Brayden Schenn.
With the game having minimal impact on the Blues' fate _ had they lost, they still would have needed a win to qualify _ the Blues spread out the ice time in the game, with the defensemen taking turns to the point that Chris Butler saw time on the power play so as not to load up on Alex Pietrangelo's ice time.
Carter Hutton made his first start since March 3 and stopped 19 of the 20 shots he faced. The only goal he allowed came from Erik Gustafsson on a shot that went over Hutton's blocker. The Blues sent Jake Allen ahead to Denver so he could get a full night's rest before the game.
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