A visit by St. Louis might be just what the Calgary Flames need to get their game back.
The Flames have dropped two straight on the heels of a five-game win streak, while division rivals Vancouver and Minnesota are starting to pull away in the Western Conference playoff race.
A Monday matchup with the Blues, a team Calgary has defeated six consecutive times, would appear to be ideal. St. Louis has lost three of its last four games and is coming off a heartbreaking 4-3 loss to Montreal on Saturday.
But any thoughts of the Flames cruising to victory have been tempered by the potential loss of Craig Conroy.
The former Blues centre is questionable, with an upper-body injury suffered late in Saturday's 3-2 overtime loss to the visiting Tampa Bay Lightning.
Conroy, who gave the Flames a short-lived 2-1 lead, has four points in three games against his former team this season and 28 points in 22 career contests versus St.
Louis.
Conroy led the Calgary attack with two goals and an assist in a 4-2 doubling of the Blues on March 6, the Flames' third victory over St. Louis in as many meetings this campaign.
The chances of a sweep in the season series, however, will be greatly reduced if Calgary turns in a repeat of Saturday's third-period collapse.
"When you are up 2-1 in the third period, you have to make sure you bury teams," Calgary forward Alex Tanguay told reporters on the weekend. "We've been doing it for a while now.
The last couple of months we've been losing games in the third period.
"It's going to be important for us down the stretch [to make sure] once we're up, the game's over."
Six days ago, the Flames trailed 2-0 in St.
Louis after 10 minutes before Tanguay, Conroy and captain Jarome Iginla went to work, accounting for seven scoring points in the final 21 minutes.
Calgary enters Monday's game occupying the eighth and final playoff spot in the West with 82 points, eight more than idle Colorado with a game in hand.
Besides the No.
1 line, Flames coach Jim Playfair is getting timely production from winger Jeff Friesen. He had the team's other goal against Tampa Bay, his second in as many outings after going 34 straight games without a goal to open the season.
Also, goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff is 3-0-0 with a shutout and a 1.
33 goals-against average against St. Louis this season.
The Blues, meanwhile, are a much different squad than the one that fell 3-0 to Calgary at the Saddledome back on Nov.
14.
They are a more organized and disciplined group under coach Andy Murray, who has guided St. Louis to a 22-12-6 record since taking over from Mike Kitchen on Dec.
12.
"He's more than qualified to coach an NHL team and form them into a good working unit," Montreal general manager Bob Gainey said of Murray, the former Los Angeles Kings' bench boss. "I think already in St.
Louis, you're seeing some of the traits of his coaching style that he brings to the team."
Saturday's regulation loss to the Canadiens marked only the eighth time in 27 outings (16-8-3) the Blues failed to pick up a point.
A respectable 12-12-7 on the road, Murray's charges could be in tough against a Flames outfit that boasts the best home mark in the league (27-6-2).
Calgary has outscored St. Louis 10-4 in the last three encounters and has not lost to the Blues in regulation since Feb. 5, 2004.
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