The St. Louis Blues are a few games into 2025 and are playing reasonably well so far. While they look to put away the failure of 2024 in the past, there’s a lot they will have to do in 2025 to get back on the path to success. The Blues are 1-2-0 in three games in January. Here’s a look at where they have succeeded and what is trending downward early in the new year.
New Year, New Power Play for the Blues
At the beginning of 2024, for their first three games, the Blues ranked dead last in the league on the power play. They were hoping to have a good start in that respect with head coach Drew Bannister, who signed a two-year deal with the team in May 2024 after replacing Craig Berube as interim head coach in December of that year. However, he did not fix the issues on the power play, and the team started the 2024-25 9-12-1 through the first 22 games, which led to Bannister’s firing. By the end of the calendar year, under new head coach Jim Montgomery, they ranked in the top 15 of the league on the power play in their final three games of 2024.
Related: Blues Shouldn’t Sacrifice the Future for a 2025 Playoff Push
The Blues have started 2025 on a good note, with their power play ranking in the top 10 thanks to Jordan Kyrou, Robert Thomas, Dylan Holloway, and Cam Fowler, who have been great offensively and are performing well on the unit. Despite losing top power-play defenseman Justin Faulk to injury recently, the Blues are still thriving on the power play without him.
Blues Not So Good on the Penalty Kill
On the other side, the penalty kill has not changed. When Montgomery was hired in November, he was expected to improve the penalty kill. In fact, since January 2024, the Blues have been among the worst penalty-killing teams in the league. They finished 24th (76.4) in the league on the penalty kill and did not didn’t move up that much even after the coaching change.
Nothing has changed in 2025. The penalty kill ranks 22nd in the league, and while the team has improved offensively, their defense is still struggling. They’ve only allowed one goal in three shorthanded situations to start the new year. If the Blues hope to push for the 2025 playoffs, they have to fix their penalty kill, which it looks like they are building toward considering their defensive prospects within their prospect pool.
Blues’ Goal Differential Is Fair
In 2024, the Blues ranked 27th in goals scored (235) and 19th in goals against (248). Last season, they put most of the pressure on their top stars, such as Kyrou, Thomas, and Pavel Buchnevich to score goals and produce points at a high rate. They also lacked defensively and weren’t in a good position cap-wise to get the depth they required to have a solid team that could contain leads.
To add depth to the roster during the offseason, the Blues acquired Alexandre Texier in a trade with the Columbus Blue Jackets, extended offer sheets to Edmonton Oilers forward Holloway and defenseman Philip Broberg that were accepted, signed brothers Mathieu and Pierre-Olivier Joseph (later traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins), and signed veteran defenseman Ryan Suter. They acquired Fowler from the Anaheim Ducks a month before the new year. With all these pieces in place before and during this season, the Blues are a team that can score but is having trouble preventing being scored on, calling into question how good the pieces they added really are and if they match their system.
In 2025, the Blues rank third in the league in goals (12) and have the fourth-most goals against (12), showing that they can be a top-scoring team but cannot shut down defensively. It will take the remainder of the season to figure out how much the team wants to change.
Next Move for the Blues in 2025
We are almost halfway through the 2024-25 season, so the Blues don’t have much time to make a playoff push. Making more trades ahead of the March 7 trade deadline seems unlikely, given all the moves they’ve made up until now. This will also be the last year Doug Armstrong will be general manager as Alexander Steen will take over in 2026, so preserving the best they can now will determine the future of the roster under Steen. If they are not in a good position by then to make the playoffs in 2025, it will be a good time to call up at least their American Hockey League prospects with the Springfield Thunderbirds so they can get some NHL experience and prepare for their future with the Blues.
