Thoughts on Blues game

Well, I thought Saturday's game was more entertaining than Thursday's game. Not just because of the outcome. The third period was pretty good with five goals being scored and all.

This game had a lot more of the Stars regulars. James Neal, Garrett Stafford and Konstantin Pushkarev were the guys I watched a lot since they don't have roster spots.

Neal was good again. He wasn't as noticeable as Thursday, but he was still good. He was very noticeable when he scored that third period goal that put the Stars up 3-2 because that was a great individual effort. He fought off two Blues, swept behind the net and scored on a backhand. Good stuff.

I thought Stafford was OK. With the injuries on defense he's in the hunt for a roster spot. He's got more of an offensive upside than Dan Jancevski, but I am not sure he is as good defensively. That's just my opinion. Anyway, Stafford, who saw some power play time, was fine.

Pushkarev didn't seem to have much of an impact when I tracked him.

As for the regulars, Dave Tippett put Jere Lehtinen back with Brenden Morrow and Mike Ribeiro and Loui Eriksson played with Mike Modano and Brad Richards. Modano did play some center on the power play. He had Neal and Eriksson as wings. Richards, who had a real strong game, and Stephane Robidas were the top duo on the point during the power play. The Ribeiro line was the top forward line on the power play. The PP generated some good chances, but was 0-8. Blues goalie Chris Mason was very good early, which is when the Stars got a lot of their chances with the man-advantage.

It's preseason so some players get put in different situations. Ribeiro did some penalty killing and was effective. Eriksson was out on there on the penalty kill, which I think is something he'll eventually do on a regular basis. The Stars lost some key penalty killers in guys like Stu Barnes and Niklas Hagman, so holes need to be filled there too, not just goal scoring.

Marty went the distance in net and was OK. I don't worry too much about his preseason games. Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.