With offense struggling, Blues are trying to do too much and it’s costing them

NASHVILLE — On a night when a lot of things did not go right for the Blues, coach Craig Berube kept coming back on one thing: forcing plays.

“We’ve got to be smarter,” he said after the Blues’ 6-2 loss to the Predators on Thursday night at Bridgestone Arena. “Giving up that goal to make it 4-2, that’s a killer. That’s a killer. Just forced plays.”

It’s not an untypical situation for a team to be in. Goals aren’t coming, so the players try to do more to make something happen. But that often turns into taking chances, taking risks, and that’s what the Blues did on Thursday. By trying to do too much, they didn’t do enough.

“Yeah, we’re forcing it,” said Blues defenseman Torey Krug, “and I think whether it’s early in the season or not, I think we feel the pressure to score goals, five on five, and I think we’re just trying to make something out of nothing rather than sticking with a game plan and letting our process dictate the game. So we have a lot of work to do.”

On the play that gnawed at Berube, Nashville was leading 3-2 early in the third period, and the Blues had the puck deep in the Predators end. Vladimir Tarasenko had the puck below the goal line and tried to pass the puck through the slot to Justin Faulk.

But two Nashville sticks suddenly appeared in the path of the pass and it was tipped away. The deflected puck was just out of the reach of Krug. It went to the boards, where Robert Thomas went to get it but was just a moment late. All of a sudden, Nashville had a three-on-one break, with Krug the lone player back. Filip Forsberg’s shot was blocked by goalie Thomas Greiss, but the puck came to Ryan Johansen and he knocked it in. In a flash, the game went from Nashville leading 3-2 with the Blues threatening to tie to 4-2 for Nashville with the Blues holding their sticks that much tighter.

“That goal, that’s a forced play,” Berube said. “Can’t give that goal up in the third. It’s right there, we’re in the game.”

It also wasn’t out of the ordinary. The Blues saw multiple odd-man rushes coming their way on Thursday, something they were trying to cut down on this season but so far with limited effectiveness. Just over two minutes after Nashville took their 4-2 lead, it had another three-on-one, this one ending with a shot that went wide.

The loss was the third in a row for the Blues, who will get a chance to end the streak on Saturday against Montreal at Enterprise Center. The Blues’ offense has gone from zero goals against Winnipeg to one against Edmonton and now two against Nashville. But the six goals allowed by the Blues, four at even-strength, one on the power play — their first allowed this season — and an empty-netter, were a season high.

“I don’t think it was a 6-2 hockey game,” said Brayden Schenn, who had one of the Blues’ two goals but was on the ice for three of Nashville’s four even-strength goals. “We played good at times, we had chances there at the beginning of the second period, made a mistake, I did, didn’t get the puck out and before I know it, it’s 2-2 and we kind of chased the game after that.”

On that play, Schenn was trying to clear the puck out of his own end but it didn’t happen and a few seconds later, the puck was in the net.

The Blues did snap their three-game-plus run of not having a five-on-five goal 67 seconds in when Robert Thomas deflected in a shot by Justin Faulk, but that was the only one they would get. Schenn scored his on a power play.

“Our guys were getting some good looks and just not burying it right now, probably gripping your sticks a little bit,” Schenn said. “We’re not scoring a lot of goals and you have to try and bear down on the chances you do get. Sometimes it only makes it worse.”

Two goals in 37 seconds late in the second period by Nashville’s fourth line, including one by ex-Blue Zach Sanford, turned a 2-1 Blues’ lead into a 3-2 deficit and set the scene for the back breaker early in the third.

“Maybe it did (damage the team’s momentum),” Krug said, “but mature teams find a way to overcome that situation and we have a veteran group in this locker room and we’ve got to find a way to overcome it and it falls on the leadership group to pull ourselves out of it. So we have to do a better job.”