Veteran forward Ryan O'Reilly has given the fans in St. Louis a great many reasons to love him during the Blues run in the 2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs, and he may have just endeared himself to that fan base even more in spite of a huge mistake on Sunday night.
As all of you already know the Blues suffered a rather deflating loss on Sunday night when their chance to win the Stanley Cup at home was snatched out of their hands. The Bruins dominated the Blues in that game, eventually triumphing by a lopsided margin of 5 - 1, but the turning point can be traced back to a moment relatively early on in the very first period of Game 6. The Blues failed to capitalize on a power play after Bruins forward Sean Kuraly tossed the puck over the glass and earned himself a delay of game minor, and then they topped that off by putting themselves in a huge hole shortly after the Bruins had killed off the Blues power play.
It was Blues forward Brayden Schenn that started digging that hole for the Blues when he drilled Boston's Joakim Nordstorm with a big hit between the numbers, sending the Bruins forward head first into the protective glass. That earned Schenn a minor penalty, but the Blues really landed themselves in hot water when the aforementioned O'Reilly tossed the puck over the glass on an undisciplined clearing attempt, putting the Blues at a 2 man disadvantage. The Bruins would score on the ensuing power play and to make matters worse it was Bruins agitator Brad Marchand who found the back of the net, giving some life to a player that had been very quiet in the Stanley Cup Final thus far.
Following the loss O'Reilly was quick to place the blame for the loss on one player, himself, stating that his mistake in the first period had effectively deflated his team. Given the large shift in momentum that would occur off the back of the play, you can hardly blame O'Reilly for being a little hard on himself here.
"Obviously not the start that we wanted. Bad play by myself there to take the penalty there to take it to five-on-three. It took the wind out of our sails, and it took too long for us to climb back in," O'Reilly said. "I'll take a little blame for that. That penalty set them up on the five-on-three and gave them a lot of confidence with a big goal there. We could have killed that penalty and gotten back to work."
Blues fans will be happy to see him take responsibility for his mistake, and will no doubt be hoping he does not repeat in in Game 7.
