Bruins to battle Blues in Stanley Cup Final: 5 quick takeaways from another Boston/St. Louis bout

The 2019 Stanley Cup Final is finally set — with the Bruins set to battle the St. Louis Blues for the right to hoist Lord Stanley’s Cup. This will be the Bruins’ 20th trip to the Cup Final — and just the fourth for St. Louis. St. Louis has yet to win a title, while the Bruins will be gunning for their seventh championship.

Here’s another look at the schedule of the best-of-seven series — with Game 1 slated for Monday night at TD Garden. Puck drop is set for 8 p.m.

We’ll continue to have plenty of preview content going up over the next week, but here are a couple of quick takeaways from the upcoming bout between Boston and St. Louis.



The Bruins and Blues have plenty of history

The Blues have never hoisted the Stanley Cup in their 52-year history — and the last time they had it within their reach, it was 49 years ago against the Bruins. Boston took care of business against St. Louis during the 1970 Final by way of a four-game sweep — capped off with the most famous goal in NHL history.



This stands as the 11th time that Boston and St. Louis will compete for a championship — no other cities have met for title bouts in the NHL, MLB, NBA and NFL.

In a more contemporary window, the Bruins went 1-0-1 against the Blues during the 2018-19 regular season — winning 5-2 at home on Jan. 17 before dropping a 2-1 shootout on the road back on Feb. 23. Chris Wagner had quite the run against the Blues during the regular season, scoring a pair of goals and adding an assist, but the physical winger will likely not play in the Stanley Cup Final after blocking a shot during Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Final against the Carolina Hurricanes.

The top storyline going into the Cup Final will likely revolve around David Backes, who played for the Blues for 10 seasons — five as captain of the club — before inking a five-year contract with Boston during the summer of 2016.

"It's a place that's near and dear to my heart, still got a lot of friends on that team, wish them the best, but I'm more concentrated on the Boston Bruins winning a Stanley Cup,” Backes said after Boston swept the Hurricanes last Thursday. “With this group of brothers that we've created here, we're all in for our team, and whoever the opponent is we're going to face them head-on."

St. Louis is the Cinderella of the Stanley Cup Playoffs

Underdog clubs like the Blue Jackets and Hurricanes might have earned plenty of the headlines so far during the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but the Blues have been on a miraculous run that no team has ever matched before.

Back on Jan. 3, the Blues were dead last in the NHL, points-wise, but under head coach Craig Berube — and plenty of contributions from rookie Jordan Binnington in net – St. Louis has gone full scorched earth against the operation, posting a record of 30-10-5 over the final four months of the regular season to punch a ticket to the postseason.

After taking down the Winnipeg Jets in the first round before rallying back from a 3-2 series deficit against the Stars in the Western Conference Semifinal, the Blues bested the Sharks over six games to advance to the Cup Final for the first time in 49 years.

St. Louis might be paced up front by forwards like Vladimir Tarasenko and Ryan O’Reilly, but they’ve had numerous contributors step up during this run — with Jaden Schwartz tallying 12 goals over 18 playoff matchups after scoring just 11 goals in 69 regular-season games.

Bruins will have to crack Binnington

Tuukka Rask has been the top factor in Boston’s run to the Cup Final, as the veteran goalie leads all netminders with a .942 save percentage over 17 postseason games. He has especially excelled when it comes to negating high-danger scoring chances (.918 save percentage), while also posting a 6.93 goals saved above average rate.

But the Blues have their own X-factor in net in Binnington, who earned a spot as a finalist for the Calder Memorial Trophy, given annually to the top rookie in the league, despite only playing in 32 games.


It might have been a short sample size, but Binnington was nothing short of dominant during St. Louis’ second-half surge, going 24-5-1 with a league-leading 1.89 goals-against average and a .927 save percentage.

Binnington will be a tough nut to crack, but Boston does have an avenue by way of special-teams play — with the B’s top-ranked power play (34.0% success rate, 1st in postseason) expected to land some punches against a Blues PK that ranks 11th out of 16th playoff clubs with a 78.0% kill rate.

The long layoff narrative continues…

The Bruins might be in the midst of the longest layoff for a team going into a Cup Final during the salary cap era, but St. Louis’ triumph over San Jose in six games will also see the Blues sitting on the shelf for quite a bit going into Game 1 on Monday.

St. Louis may not have to schedule an intrasquad scrimmage like the Bruins in order to keep their legs fresh, but five days between games is still quite the break going into a Cup Final. The first 20 minutes of Monday’s game should be ... interesting.

Get ready to hear this song … a lot:



Chris Pinkert of NHL.com has the full story on this tune — but get prepared to hear it a TON when the Bruins head down to Enterprise Center for Games 3 and 4.