St. Louis Blues at Minnesota Wild 5/4/22 - NHL Picks & Predictions

The St. Louis Blues look to take a 2-0 lead in their NHL Western Conference first-round best-of-seven series when they visit the Minnesota Wild on Wednesday. St Louis beat Minnesota 4-0 in Game 1 of the series on Monday night. David Perron scored a hat-trick for St Louis in the victory, while Ville Husso stopped all 37 shots in goals for the Blues in his St. Louis postseason debut.

During the regular season, Vladimir Tarasenko was the leading goal scorer for St Louis with 34 and the leader in points with 82, while Robert Thomas was the leader in assists with 57. In goal, Ville Husso is 1-0-0 with a goals against average of 0.00, save percentage of 1.000 and one shutout. St Louis scores an average of 3.77 goals per game and allows an average of 2.92 goals per game. The St Louis power-play scores 27.0% of the time and its penalty-kill unit is successful 84.1% of the time.

Minnesota looks to bounce back with a victory in Game 1 at home Wednesday to even the series with St. Louis. Minnesota ended the regular season four points better than St Louis, but has lost the home ice advantage after losing Game 1. Marc-Andre Fleury made 27 saves in goal for Minnesota in the loss. Cam Talbot, who was 13-0-3 over his final 16 starts in goal, is likely to be in goal Wednesday for the Wild.

Kirill Kaprizov was the leading goal scorer for Minnesota with 47, the leader in assists with 61 and the points leader with 108. In goal, Cam Talbot was 32-12-4 with a goals-against average of 2.77, save percentage of .911 and three shutouts. During the regular season, Minnesota scored an average of 3.72 goals per game and allowed an average of 3.04 goals per game. Minnesota's power-play scored 20.5% of the time and its penalty-kill unit was successful 76.1% of the time.