Last season was a difficult one for St. Louis Blues goaltender Jordan Binnington.
Binnington, 30, was 27-27-0-6 with a 3.31 goals-against average, a .894 save percentage, and two shutouts. Not only did he struggle to stop the puck consistently, but he also seemed to be more focused on fighting with players from opposing teams.
The feisty goaltender almost came to blows with perhaps one of the nicest guys in the game, Minnesota Wild goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, back in March of 2023. The officials prevented it from happening, but Binnington was ejected from the game and suspended for two games for throwing a punch at a Wild forward.
Binnington finished last season with 29 penalty minutes. With Binnington earning a lot of penalty minutes, it appeared that his number one job of keeping the puck out of the net went by the wayside.
Luckily for Binnington and the Blues, the goaltender did not carry that mentality into this season. Rather, Binnington looked like the goaltender who took the league by storm in the 2018-19 season and was the main reason the Blues won their first Stanley Cup in franchise history in defeating the Boston Bruins in seven games.
With one game remaining in the Blues season, a year in which they did not clinch a playoff spot, Binnington has had a terrific year for his hockey club. As of this writing (Sunday, April 14), Binnington is 28-21-0-4 with a 2.88 goals-against average, a .911 save percentage, and three shutouts.
There are several reasons why Binnington returned to being a consistent and reliable goaltender for the Blues. For starters, he regained his focus.
Going into the season, Binnington wanted to focus on doing his job. He wanted to win as many games as he could and stop pucks, two main areas of focus for every goaltender.
While the Blues will not be playing in the postseason this year, one could say that Binnington accomplished both of those goals. This is especially the case when it comes to Binnington wanting to stop a lot of pucks this year.
The Blues are a team that gives up a lot of shots. They are currently eighth in the league in that category as they give up about 32 shots a game, which is not a recipe for success in the NHL.
In 56 starts this season, Binnington has faced 1749 shots. This means that the Blues give up about 31 shots a game when he is between the pipes.
When one puts it in that context, that .911 save percentage is remarkable. That mark is better than his career save percentage of .907, and it should also show the Blues and the rest of the NHL that he is one of the better goaltenders in the league.
Another reason why Binnington has had success this season is because he does not seem to be taking things personally anymore. He was not baiting opponents to fight, he was not trying to shoulder all of the blame when his team lost, and he just seemed to be more relaxed in goal this year.
To sum up the paragraph above, he got out of his head. He worried about the things he could control and focused on doing everything he could to help his team.
Lastly, despite all of his struggles last season, the team showed a lot of confidence in him this season. He has played a lot of games and has played well in those games, and when he did have a bad game, the club would go right back to him in the next tilt.
Yes, Binnington has shown that he is a confident goaltender. With that said, it is probably nice to know that the team still thinks highly of him and believes enough in him to help get them back to being a consistent winning franchise.
This offseason should be a much calmer one for Binnington, which could mean that Binnington will be even better for the Blues next season.
ITR 43: It's Winning Time – Inside The Rink
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