You’re going to hear it a million times but in case you’ve been living under a rock Ben Bishop is from St. Louis. He went to Chaminade and played with the Junior Blues and was later drafted by the Blues in the 3rd round of the 2005 draft. He was in the minors for much of his time in St. Louis only appearing in 13 total games for the Blues and only started 10 of those. It wasn’t until his time with the Lightning that he rose to a superstar and became one of the best goalies in the NHL over the like 5 or 6 years. This year has been no different as he’s only giving up 1.98 goals against average and has a .934 save percentage.
Bishop is now a Vezina Trophy finalist the award given to the NHL’s best goaltender but the question on everybody’s mind is of obviously whether or not this has all been a long con between the Blues and Ben Bishop. It makes sense that he would be playing at the highest level of his career going into this series. Think about it how obvious would it be if Bishop was having a mediocre year and then tanked when he plays the Blues. Bishop also has a winning record against the Blues this year and is giving up only 1.75 goals a game against them. This is where you have to do your own research and use your brain he is doing good in the regular season so that nobody will think about it when he gives up some soft ones. Now I know where you’re already going with this “if he was good all year and then sucked against the blues wouldn’t that draw more attention to the long con” that’s a fair point I really can’t address it any further since it hurts my overall argument.
In conclusion yes Ben Bishop is a sleeper agent for the Blues so when you see him allowing 3-4 goals a game and giving up some softies that are out of the norm for him now you know why.
🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔 Don’t click on those articles fuck them I just wanted to steal their headlines to further my argument.
As for the actual preview idk man. I mean both teams are buzzing and won keys games on the road behind a relentless forecheck, good defense, and stellar goalkeeping. It’s all going to come down to line matchups. The Blues need an answer to Benn cause he’s scored 5 goals in 2 games against Bennington. We said the same thing about Laine before the Jets series and he still tore us apart. As long as our top line can get some more production I think we take care of business. I love the Schwartz and Schenn combo and I think Maroons strength is going to be a key factor in the series.
It’s ultimately going to come down to Bennington vs Bishop and as we’ve already discussed both goalies are playing at an elite level and have a similar attitude and level headedness (is that a word?).
My official prediction is Blues in 6 due to Ben Bishop being a sleeper agent. As for tonight I think the Blues take the first game at home however I expect us to lose one at home in these first 2 games.
Projected lineup is below game starts at 8:30PM tonight on NBCSN.
Dane