Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Pregame chat, unique stick help O’Reilly deliver dominant Game 4 performance

HHiR6N6UVn9z
The Blues regain momentum and tie the series with a Game 4 win behind two goals from Ryan O'Reilly. The Bruins lose a key piece after Zdeno Chara takes a puck to the mouth and doesn't return to the game.

ST. LOUIS — Ryan O’Reilly’s traditional pre-game chat with his dad hammered home a simple message: Leave it all out there, stop overthinking the game, and trust yourself more.

Brian O’Reilly’s words on Monday afternoon resonated as his son’s two goals helped the St. Louis Blues top the Boston Bruins 4-2 in Game 4 to even the Stanley Cup Final at two games apiece. Game 5 is Thursday (8 p.m. ET; NBC) at TD Garden.

O’Reilly opened the scoring 43 seconds into game — a play he started by winning an offensive zone face-off. Vince Dunn’s shot was tipped by Zach Sanford in front and stopped by Tuukka Rask’s right pad. Unfortunately for the goaltender, the rebound went right to O’Reilly’s stick as he was spinning off Bruins defenseman Torey Krug. The wraparound was converted with help from his incredibly unique blade.

Screen Shot 2019-06-03 at 11.35.04 PM

“It’s obviously a weird stick,” O’Reilly told the “31 Thoughts” podcast back in October.

Because O’Reilly likes to make plays with the heel, he uses a straight blade that features a hooked toe. He says it gives him more control of the puck, and it certainly showed as he avoided Rask’s skate and tucked home the first goal of the game.

Teammates have tried out O’Reilly’s stick, but the reviews aren’t positive. Some like to joke that the toe is like that because he stuck it in a door. But Warrior actually sent him a plastic blade, and after using a heat gun he was able to find a curve to his liking.

“I don’t dare touch his sticks,” said linemate Zach Sanford. “I let him do his thing. Those are his.”

“He makes it work,” said Patrick Maroon.

The game-winning goal, which O’Reilly delivered with 9:22 left in the third period, was the result of Alex Pietrangelo’s awareness that the Bruins were changing and O’Reilly’s decision to drive to the net and hope for a rebound.

The “pass off pads” play is something the Blues work on in practice. The idea is to create havoc in front of goal, and with a player driving to net they often lead to dangerous scoring chances.

“The way it developed we knew we were going to have something to the net with Petro coming down there,” said O’Reilly, who hadn’t scored since Game 1 of the Western Conference Final. “I’m just trying to do what I can to get to that back side and it was a great bounce. It happens sometimes and you just try and throw it on the net. Sometimes you get those bounces. [I] was just lucky to be on that end of it.”

The feeling many had heading into Game 4 was the same as it was when Game 2 approached. The Bruins had dominated the previous game and there was a feeling that they would continue to build off that victory. Instead, as they’ve done so many times this season, the Blues reset and bounced back.

Game 4 was the most consistent game of the series for St. Louis thus far. They were relentless in establishing their forecheck, delivered 44 hits, remained disciplined and gave Boston only two power plays. There were a few extended periods of time Monday night when they had the Bruins hemmed into their own zone keeping the pressure on, much to the delight of the 18,805 fans in attendance inside of the sold-out Enterprise Center.

Now it’s a best-of-three series and the next time the Blues play at home — Game 6 on Sunday — the Stanley Cup could be awarded that evening. Two more efforts like what they executed in Game 4 and St. Louis will be yelling “Play Gloria!” for years to come.

“From start to finish, guys kept playing, and when they made a push [we] responded well and we kept going one shift at a time,” said O’Reilly. “As a group we brought that and it worked tonight.”

Game 5 of the 2019 Stanley Cup Final airs on NBC at 8 p.m. ET on Thursday (stream here).

MORE BLUES-BRUINS GAME 3:
Blues even Stanley Cup Final vs. Bruins in Game 4
Stanley Cup Buzzer: O’Reilly makes difference for Blues
Bruins’ Chara to be re-evaluated, status for Game 5 unknown

————

Sean Leahy is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @Sean_Leahy.