FanHouse AndyMcDonald

The St. Louis Blues are in the middle of a series of must-win games in their quest for the Stanley Cup playoffs. The run continued Thursday in Detroit, where St. Louis tried to rebound from a rather listless effort Wednesday night in Chicago. They got plenty of help from one of their young guns. David Backes is in his second full season with the Blues and was on the cusp of a 30-goal season heading into Thursday's game. He's not "on the cusp" anymore.

Entering the 2008-09 season, not much was expected from the St. Louis Blues. Most people recognized their talented young core, but few, if any, were predicting a trip to the playoffs. With just 13 games remaining on their schedule, the Blues enter Tuesday's game in Edmonton just two points out of the final playoff spot in the Western Conference, and have an opportunity to move into a tie for the No. 8 spot with a win (and a Dallas loss). So, how did they get here?

We're in the home stretch of the NHL season, and both conference playoff races are heating up as the standings change on a daily basis. The Eastern Conference has seven teams separated by just seven points in the No's 4 through 10 spots, while everybody except Phoenix and Colorado is still competing for a playoff spot in the West.

Sharks 5, Bruins 2: In what was the premier matchup of the night, San Jose scored four unanswered goals in the third period on its way to a 5-2 win over the Bruins.

After Milan Michalek gave the Sharks their first lead of the night midway through the third period, Joe Thornton helped burn his former team when he chipped in his 13th goal of the season. Ryane Clowe recorded three assists in the win, while Evgeni Nabokov made 28 saves.

Devils 3, Rangers 0: Scott Clemmensen has been fantastic for the Devils this season in the absence of Martin Brodeur, and on Monday night he registered his first shutout in New Jersey's 3-0 win over the Rangers.

Zach Parise picked up a pair of goals for the Devils, while Bobby Holik scored what proved to be the game-winner midway through the second period.

If the St. Louis Blues didn't have bad luck this season, they would have absolutely no luck. On Saturday night, the Blues announced that forward Paul Kariya will be undergoing surgery to repair a torn muscle in his hip, as reported by Jeremy Rutherford of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The surgery will, obviously, keep him out of the lineup for quite a while, if not the remainder of the season.

The 34-year old forward had not played in a game for the Blues since November 5, a 5-2 loss at Anaheim, while he had 15 points (2 goals, 13 assists) in 11 games this season, after a 65 point effort a season ago.

One of my favorite hockey moments will always be game 6 of the 2003 Stanley Cup finals when, after being on the wrong end of a Scott Stevens elbow, Kariya returned to the game and blasted a slap shot behind Martin Brodeur, helping the Ducks force a game 7. Ugly hit. Fantastic shot.

Kariya joins Erik Johnson, Manny Legace, and Andy McDonald -- just to name a few -- on the lengthy list of Blues to miss significant time this season in a variety of bizarre manners. Just as a reminder, Johnson injured his knee in a golf cart accident, while Legace was knocked out of the lineup after he tripped and fell on Sarah Palin's red carpet.

There were three pretty significant injuries in the NHL over the past week, as Francois Beauchemin (Ducks), Andrew Ference (Bruins) and Andy McDonald (Blues) all suffered major leg injuries that will keep them out of their respective lineups for extended periods of time.

A quick look at each injury, and the impact they will have on each team.

First, for the Ducks, Beauchemin suffered a torn ACL in Anaheim's 4-3 loss to Nashville on Thursday night, and is expected to miss the next six months. The 28-year old defenseman has been a steady 25-minute per game player for the Ducks since being acquired in a trade with Columbus during the 2005-06 campaign.

Aside from being second on the team in ice-time, Beauchemin was also one of the team's best shot blockers and penalty killers. His injury, combined with the early season trade of Mathieu Schneider to Atlanta (for salary cap purposes) has left the Ducks once vaunted defensive unit rather depleted. Let's face it, no disrespect to Kent Huskins and Bret Hedican intended, but it's not exactly the unit that hoisted the Stanley Cup two years ago.

If you're looking for a positive for the Ducks, Beauchemin's injury and ensuing placement on the long-term injury list has cleared enough space under the league's salary cap for the team to bring up top prospect Bobby Ryan. Ryan, a former No. 2 overall pick, had registered 19 points in 14 games for the Iowa Chops of the American Hockey League.

After a very quiet first round against Minnesota (forgive me lord readers, for I hath sinned), the Ducks top line of Kunitz-McDonald-Selanne had their way with the Canucks last night in a 5-1 win, with dandy Andy McDonald getting his first career playoff hat trick.

The Canucks injury and offensive woes continued, with Sami Salo, Kevin Bieksa, and Matt Cooke all being scratched from Game One due to their ailments.

At first, it appeared that the Canucks were the more prepared and well-rested team, as the Canucks were hustling hard and got out to a 1-0 lead thanks to Jeff "The Brabarian" Cowan. Could it be that the Canucks hadn't run out of energy yet?

Well, reality sunk in, the gas ran out, and the wheels came off as the Canucks started taking bad penalty after bad penalty. The Ducks got three quick goals to end the first frame, and it was pretty obvious that they were in cruise control after that. The Canucks gave up nine man-advantages to the Ducks, who used their speed and energy to force the Canucks to take plenty of lazy penalties. It was frustrating to watch the Canucks outmatched in every which way.

(Last night's Ducks pounding even found it's way to my brain, apprently, since I've had trouble thinking straight all day... ayayayaye!! Did I screw up anything else?) Yeah, so the Canucks yanked Roberto Luongo and basically said "The game is yours!" in the 3rd period. Coach Vigneault was obviously acknowledging that this game was lost and he wanted to rest Luongo for Friday's tilt. Lose the battle, win the war, right?

The Canucks' Power(less) Play also continued to suck, going 0-for-7 on the night (including a first period 2-man PP) and now sits at 3-for-45 in the playoffs. Once again, nobody on the Canucks is willing to pay the price, leaving Markus Naslund and the Sedins to fire shots from the perimeter, which doesn't really challenge J-S Giguere to make tough saves.

(edited 11:53am)