St Louis Blues: Top 30 Goaltenders in Franchise History
8. Vincent Riendeau
1988-91; 122 games, 58-45-16 record, .883 save percentage, 3.34 GAA, 4 shutouts; 21 postseason games, 9-11 record, 1 shutout
Riendeau can easily get lost in the shuffle when ranking the St Louis Blues’ best goalies ever, largely because he played in somewhat of a transitional period between the two best goalies in franchise history, Mike Liut and Curtis Joseph. With that said, he put up excellent numbers himself and is clearly one of the 10 best goalies in franchise history in terms of statistics.
The strongest factor playing in Riendeau’s favor is that he won nine playoff games in just three full seasons with the Blues. Riendeau took over for an injured Joseph in the 1990 playoffs, starting all seven games of a tightly contested Division Finals series with the Chicago Blackhawks.
Though the Blues lost the series, Riendeau picked up three wins and kept the team in it, with the exception of a Game 7 in which he gave up four goals on his first 15 shots faced.
Riendeau was able to wrestle the starting job away from Joseph in 1990-91 and led the team to the playoffs, where he earned four wins in a first-round series victory over the Detroit Red Wings and then was in net for two wins during a six-game second-round series loss to the Minnesota North Stars.
Though the numbers may not clearly show it due to the era Riendeau played in—the offensive peak of the NHL’s history—he was quite steady in net. Despite his plus-3.00 goals against averages and his sub-.900 save percentages in each season, Riendeau’s goalie point shares were 7.0 in 89-90 and 7.4 in 90-91, both very good ratings.
As Joseph emerged as an elite goaltender and prospects Guy Hebert and Pat Jablonski were knocking on the NHL club’s door, the need for Riendeau was lessened, and he was traded to Detroit at the beginning of the 1991-92 season.
While his Blues stint wasn’t extremely long, Riendeau was one of the most successful netminders that the organization has ever had.
Next: 7. Brian Elliott