St. Louis Blues vs. Minnesota Wild: Stanley Cup Playoffs, Game 5 Prediction, Preview, Picks & Odds - 5/10/2022

Western Conference First Round, Game 5 -- Series tied 2-2

Time: 9:30 p.m. ET

Venue: Xcel Energy Center, St. Paul, MN

Where to watch: ESPN, Bally Sports Wisconsin Extra, Bally Sports North, Bally Sports Midwest

DraftKings: Wild -140, Blues +120

BetMGM: Wild -140, Blues +115

Caesars: Wild -130, Blues +110

There’s no way Jordan Binnington has saved the St. Louis Blues again. I swear, if he finds himself at the receiving end of another Stanley Cup because of him and not Ville Husso, the world may erupt in flames because of stupid shenanigans.

But it’s a simple equation right now: Binnington goes in, the Blues win Game 4 and the first-round series is tied 2-2 heading back to St. Paul, where the Minnesota Wild will try to not get torched by Jordan Kyrou in this all-important Game 5 on Tuesday.

The Blues answered with a 5-2 win in Game 4 to even the series, led by two goals from Kyrou and Binnington made 28 saves to get the Blues a much-needed victory after getting blown out in Game 3. Now the series goes back to Minnesota, where the Wild are expected to have a much better effort.

"It felt good, I felt prepared," Binnington said. "We had a good start to the game, a really good first period. Definitely a big win, a hard-fought win. We had guys step in the lineup, but I felt pretty good.

"Definitely I had to be patient. Nothing this morning, wait for the game, just hanging out at home and just prepping."

Husso was far and away the better goalie in St. Louis this season, but it would appear that Binnington can still be trusted in big games. Whether he can do it again on the road, given the circumstances of what’s happened lately, remains to be seen.

"Yeah, it's definitely nice to get the first goal," Kyrou said. "It's a huge confidence builder for the team, especially here at home. The crowd was unbelievable tonight and it definitely got us going."

It turned out to be a rough game for Marc-Andre Fleury making 29 saves, and the fact the game completely just went off the rails after Kirill Kaprizov tied the game says a lot about how good the Blues were on this day. 

"We just felt we got disrupted a little early in the game, obviously, with [a] four-minute (minor to Kevin Fiala at 8:42 of the first period) and … then another high stick (on Joel Eriksson Ek) and then 4-on-4, so, the first period, we wanted to get to our game, and we weren't able to get to our game because of that," Minnesota coach Dean Evason said.

"But having said that, we've got to stay out of the box too. It disrupted everything. ... It disrupts the flow of the game, disrupts what we want to do, what we want to get to, 5-on-5, right? But having said that, we have to find a way to get to it. We did get momentum from those kills. So, we didn't do enough to get to our game, but [the penalties] hurt us early as well."

I have a strong feeling that the Wild will handle business at home. I trust Fleury in a big-game situation, and then I feel Binnington will let in a couple early, and we can trust Minnesota will win a game it needs to. Wild win 4-2

Blues are 17-9 off a home win this season.

Blues are 46-32 the past three seasons off a win by two goals or more.

Wild are 9-1 this season after two straight division games.

Wild are 2-7 off a road loss by two goals or more this season.

Blues:

Brandon Saad -- Ryan O'Reilly -- David Perron

Pavel Buchnevich -- Robert Thomas -- Vladimir Tarasenko

Ivan Barbashev -- Tyler Bozak -- Jordan Kyrou

Alexei Toropchenko -- Logan Brown -- Nathan Walker

Torey Krug -- Colton Parayko

Nick Leddy -- Justin Faulk

Niko Mikkola -- Robert Bortuzzo

Jordan Binnington

Wild:

Kirill Kaprizov -- Ryan Hartman -- Nick Bjugstad

Kevin Fiala -- Frederick Gaudreau -- Matt Boldy

Jordan Greenway -- Joel Eriksson Ek -- Marcus Foligno

Nicolas Deslauriers -- Tyson Jost -- Brandon Duhaime

Jacob Middleton -- Jared Spurgeon

Jonas Brodin -- Matt Dumba

Jon Merrill -- Dmitry Kulikov

Marc-Andre Fleury