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Blues-Avalanche Preview

Mar 5, 2010 - 6:09 PM By MATT BECKER STATS Senior Writer

St. Louis (30-25-9) at Colorado (36-22-6), 9:00 p.m. EDT

For the second year in a row, the St. Louis Blues appear poised to make a late-season surge for a playoff berth.

The Blues look to win six straight for the first time in more than six years Saturday night, though the last team to beat them stands in the way as they visit the Colorado Avalanche.

With 18 games remaining, St. Louis (30-25-9) is in the mix with several teams for one of the final playoff spots in the Western Conference. This is somewhat surprising considering the Blues were 12 points out of eighth place with the conference's second-worst record on Jan. 8.

St. Louis, however, has been through this kind of turnaround before.

Last season, the Blues closed with a 9-1-1 run to surpass five teams in the standings and earn the sixth seed in the West.

"I'm new to the situation, but I'm aware of what happened last year," said coach Davis Payne, who took over for the fired Andy Murray on Jan. 2. "This is a new (season). We know exactly what we have to do and it's good for us to have that type of experience to know it's possible."

A sputtering offense was St. Louis' biggest problem earlier in the season, but that isn't the case anymore.

The Blues have 23 goals during their season-best five-game winning streak, scoring at least four in each. St. Louis, which hasn't won six in a row since Dec. 6-18, 2003, had reached the four-goal mark just once in its previous 12 games.

"Unfortunately it's taken us this long to get it going," T.J. Oshie said after Thursday's 6-1 win over Dallas. "Now everyone is getting used to each other on a consistent basis."

Oshie and Paul Kariya are leading St. Louis' suddenly resurgent offense. Oshie has scored in each of the last four games, while Kariya has four goals and four assists during the winning streak.

The Blues haven't lost since falling 5-2 to the Avalanche on Feb. 8. Chris Mason allowed five goals on 15 shots before being pulled midway through the second period, while Colorado's Brandon Yip scored twice and Paul Stastny had a goal and an assist.

As the Blues have turned things around since that loss at the Pepsi Center, the Avalanche (36-22-6) have struggled.

Colorado, sixth in the West, is coming off Thursday's 3-1 loss to Phoenix, its third defeat in four games. The Avalanche have managed only three goals in those losses, and the defense hasn't been any better, yielding three goals in each of the last four.

Craig Anderson has been a workhorse in net for Colorado, making 19 consecutive starts, but is showing some signs of wearing down. He is 1-3-0 with a 2.77 goals-against average in the last four after going 11-4-0 with a 1.73 GAA and three shutouts in his previous 15.

Anderson didn't have much trouble against the Blues a month ago, though, stopping 32 of 34 shots.