from Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

What’s maddening is how the Blues lost.

“You get down one at home and hope to pick it up a notch and that would be a wake-up call,” Blues captain David Backes said after Game 1. “It almost took until the third period until we finally got our legs going and played our brand of hockey.”

Therein lies a fundamental problem: With so much at stake, including their own reputations as competitors, why do the Blues need a wake-up call?

If the Blues can’t get cranked up by the challenge of taking on the Wild and shutting up skeptics who expect another STL postseason collapse, then what will it take to get them going? This is perplexing.

Blues players are well aware of the team’s futile-franchise postseason rep and resent being linked to it. The players know that the long-suffering Blues faithful have experienced more playoff disappointments than any fan base should have to endure. But the current Blues don’t think it’s fair to dump historical grievances on them.

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