Blues fire Yeo, appointed interim coach Bérubé | Morning skating

Yeo still had a season to sign his contract with the Blues after this one.

The announcement was made about 90 minutes after the Blues defeated the Kings, one of the worst defeats against one of the worst teams in the league this week. The Blues lost to Chicago 1-0 on Wednesday.

The Blues have 17 points; only kings, with 15, have fewer.

"Well yes, it 's frustrating, it' s disappointing," Yeo told reporters during his usual session after the match, before the announcement. "Losing this game at home." We wanted to bounce back after the last game, parity aside, you want to win every game, it's bad when you lose, it's safe. is disappointing not to have it tonight. "

Yeo was 73-49-11 in one full season and two partial seasons with the Blues. He replaced Ken Hitchcock on February 1, 2017, starting with a 7-1 record. The team did not participate in the playoffs after the 2017-18 season, missing one point. Expectations were high for 2018-19, but the team only won one consecutive victory in the first 19 games of the season and many Yeo moves did not allow to generate progress.

Yeo coached Minnesota for five seasons before being released. The Blues hired him as coach after Hitchcock announced that it would result in more than one season, but Hitchcock did not finish this season, getting fired at mid-season. -path. This blues team qualified for the playoffs, which included a win over the Wild for Yeo.

Bérubé coached the Philadelphia Flyers for two seasons, recording a 75-58-28 record in the regular season between 2013 and 2015. He coached the Flyers for seven seasons and also coached the farm team. of the AHL team. He joined the Blues organization as coach of their American League team, the Chicago Wolves, in 2015-2016, before joining Yeo's first staff. He led the Wolves to 44-19-13 and a top spot in the Central Division.

Berube has played 17 seasons in the NHL, with Philadelphia, Toronto, Calgary, Washington and the New York Islanders. He has scored 61 goals, 98 assists and 3,149 penalty minutes in 1,054 regular season games. He is one of only three NHL players to play 1,000 regular season games and 3,000 penalty minutes.

Armstrong and Bérubé will hold a press conference Tuesday morning before the team's training and then their flight to Nashville in order to play against the Predators on Wednesday.

The Blues had struggled defensively at the start of the season and, when they solved the problem and started allowing fewer goals, their attack went dry. Yeo has moved the players to try to find combinations of effective lines, but nothing seems to have worked.

Asked before the game in Vegas, the team's only highlight of last week, he needed to look at the whole situation or the small picture trying to solve the problems of the game. Team, Yeo said:

"I do not know what it is to be honest with you.If you want to see the big picture, then I think you look where we are in the rankings, it's disappointing. We have games under way Everyone, optically, is probably worse than we have in terms of our chances of really having a good season and being where we want to be at the end of the season. however, to get there, we need to focus a bit and make sure we focus on tomorrow's match and then focus on the next match. "

Speculation on a permanent replacement will undoubtedly be centered on former Chicago coach (and Blues coach) Joel Quenneville, although Quenneville has been paid $ 6 million by the Blackhawks this season to no one. to have done nothing, nothing indicates that he would jump to the task.

The Blues' offensive struggles continued, perhaps reaching a critical level, as the team lost to Los Angeles, the team with the worst record in the league, 2-0 at the Enterprise Center on Monday night.

And offensive struggles mean struggles in general since the team has lost four of its last five games.

It was the Blues' second consecutive white game and their third in four games. The race also included a 1-0 shutout in Chicago, a team that had no win in eight straight games at a time.

"I do not know, we just could not score," said center Tyler Bozak. "We knew the game was going to be tight, every time you play LA, you score weak points, they check very hard, we have had a few chances, I've had some of them myself. goalkeeper has made good stops, but we have to start burying them at the right time if we want to win those close games. "

"You can not win hockey games without scoring goals," said captain Alex Pietrangelo. "These are the games where you have to find a way to score goals, we've had 29 shots on goal, we've had opportunities, I think we just have to, we'll get rebounds if we go to the net."

"The chances come from hard work," said striker Vladimir Tarasenko. "These are not fancy occasions or good games, we have to find a way to put them in. It's hard to win if we do not score goals … I now have words. We are trying very hard, maybe too much. "

After playing against the worst team in the league, the blues will only be more difficult the rest of the week. They play in Nashville, the team with the best record of the Western Conference on Wednesday and Friday, and Winnipeg on Saturday.

"It's time to win games and tie them up, it's now because there are very good opponents," Pietrangelo said. "We have very good opponents."

The Blues fell behind in the second period when Matt Luff scored his first NHL goal, finishing the double with Adrian Kempe. The goal came after a long time in the Kings area for the Blues that did not lead to a goal. The Kings then won a face-off puck, broke and took the lead.

The score remained so until Anze Kopitar scored in an empty goal with 29.5 seconds left to play.

The Blues had just lost a shutout in San Jose on Saturday and had also been cleared two games before Chicago. They have now failed to score in seven consecutive periods and have scored in only two of the last 13 periods, the first and second periods they were in Las Vegas.

"We just have to find a way," said coach Mike Yeo. "That's what we have to do, it's frustrating, it's infuriating because we can not seem to be able to put everything together at the same time, we're doing the strange game now and at the beginning of the year, we scored The defensive game was not there and we cleared the defensive game and we do not score goals anymore, we have to organize everything now.

"It's frustrating, it's disappointing to lose this game at home." We wanted to bounce back after the last game. "Parity aside, you want to win every game. you're losing … it's safe, it's disappointing not to have it tonight. "

The Blues also failed to score on the power play in the first period, scoring their scoreless run of six power play losses and 16 forward opportunities in all. They also had a numerical advantage in the third period they could not score.

FABBRI ACCELERATED TO O & # 39; REILLY LINE

Robby Fabbri has played on a line-up rookie Robert Thomas in six of his eight games this season. On the other two occasions, his centurion was Tyler Bozak.

But Monday night, facing the Los Angeles Kings, Fabbri will find himself on the Blues' bottom line, centered on Ryan O'Reilly, and with Vladimir Tarasenko on the right wing.

"You end up with O & # 39; Ry, Vladi _, this should make you very exciting," said coach Mike Yeo after Monday morning's session at the Enterprise Center. "We trust what he can do, now go ahead and show it."

Fabbri has a goal and a pass in eight games and one plus-1. Since his first game against Vegas on November 1, when he only saw 8 minutes and 45 seconds of ice, Fabbri played at least 13 minutes in each game and showed no ill effects from both. knee surgeries that have derailed most of his last two years. seasons.

Against kings, he will be part of a line with a lot of address.

"Vladi has been selfless, too altruistic often," Yeo said. "He has a lot of main audiences, especially for O. Ry.These two guys have very well clicked.We have to find someone to start playing for Vladi too.

"And Robby Fabbri has this ability – he's tenacious – I think it's an important quality of anyone playing with talented players and someone like Vladi.

"You need someone who is tenacious, someone who will help dig pucks, create turnovers, put the puck on our stick, and, just as importantly, get the puck." on his stick. "

Fabbri-O & # 39; Reilly-Tarasenko

Sanford Barbashev-Sundqvist

Carl Gunnarsson, Jaden Schwartz and Alexander Steen are still out of the aftermath of an upper body injury.

Pat Maroon (upper body) and Robert Bortuzzo (lower body) remain on the injured reserve.

So in the immediate future, including the game against the Kings, the Blues are doing well without attackers or defenders in reserve.

Yeo described Steen as being day-to-day.

Maroon skated Monday morning before the Blues morning skate.

"He felt good there, so he's moving forward," said Yeo. "I would say hope for the weekend but we'll see."

The prognosis is not as optimistic for Schwartz and Gunnarsson.

"I'm expecting both guys to go out all weekend and we'll see how they manage next week," Yeo said.

Bortuzzo, who has been part of the IR since Oct. 25, will miss his 12th consecutive game on Monday and his 13th game since his last 14th game. Yeo said that Bortuzzo had recently been skating and that he was progressing.

Calvin Petersen marks his third NHL start on Monday in Los Angeles. Petersen, 24, was 1-1 with an average of 2.26 and a .935 save percentage.

The Blues beat the Kings 2-1 last season, dividing two games in St. Louis and beating the Kings 7-2 on March 10 in Los Angeles, which was the last time the teams met.

"I think they're going to be desperate," Yeo said. "This part is difficult, again for us, no matter who we play at this moment, we just have to be more focused on ourselves, we do not have time to think and worry about this. that they will bring this game.

"Because we do not know it, I would expect them to come in and play very hard.It is a proud group that has a lot of excellent hockey players in its team. So we have to expect their best. "

"We're coming back from a road trip where we could have had better results," Yeo said. "Unfortunately, we do not necessarily come back with the best feeling, but I think in recent weeks we have strengthened our confidence in our game."

"And now, we have to do it more consistently, regardless of your opponent, no matter where you play, and it must be tonight."