St. Louis Blues: Chicago Wolves Advance to Second Round of AHL Playoffs
The St. Louis Blues’ AHL affiliate moved one step closer to the Calder Cup on Wednesday night.
Wednesday night wasn’t a great night for the St. Louis Blues, what with them losing 4-3 to the Nashville Predators in Game 1 of their playoff series, but the night was a little bit more pleasant for some other members of the organization.
Facing the Charlotte Checkers in a winner-take-all Game 5, the Blues’ AHL affiliate, the Chicago Wolves, came away with a 3-2 victory on Wednesday and will keep chasing the Calder Cup.
The Wolves will now advance to a best-of-seven second-round series with the Detroit Red Wings’ AHL affiliate, the Grand Rapids Griffins. That series doesn’t begin until May 3 and could last until May 16 if it goes seven games, so the Blues certainly won’t be getting mass reinforcements for quite a while longer. With that said, there’s a very long layoff between now and the start of the Wolves’ next series, so it’s possible that we could see the Blues call up some extra players for depth purposes in the meantime. The most likely player to receive such a promotion would be defenseman Jordan Schmaltz, who spent the final month-and-a-half of the regular season in the NHL and has shuttled between the AHL and NHL during the playoffs.
Winger Kenny Agostino, who led the AHL in points this season and impressed in a midseason cameo with the Blues, got the scoring started just 1:50 into the fist period:
Kenny Agostino buries one from the left circle on the @Dynegy_Retail power play to give the Wolves a 1-0 lead just 1:50 in! pic.twitter.com/8Td13lEkjf
— Chicago Wolves (@Chicago_Wolves) April 27, 2017
The Wolves never trailed again. Forward Andrew Agozzino scored his first goal of the postseason at 4:28 to put the Wolves up 2-0.
At 4:01 in the second, rookie Adam Musil–who’s arguably been the star of the postseason for the Wolves–scored a shorthanded goal to give the Wolves a 3-0 advantage.
Adam Musil does it all! The rookie puts away a wrister short-handed to make it 3-0 Chicago! #CHIvsCHA pic.twitter.com/ojTnAKom6f
— Chicago Wolves (@Chicago_Wolves) April 27, 2017
The 20-year-old Musil joined the Wolves late in the season after playing the entirety of the WHL season with his junior club, the Red Deer Rebels.
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But since joining the pro club, the 6-foot-3, 200-pound forward has been unstoppable. The goal Wednesday night was his third of the postseason, and he also added two assists earlier in the series.
Likewise, defenseman Jake Walman has been very impressive after joining the Wolves late in the year. Though he only played in three of the series’ five games, the Providence College product has been productive, scoring a crucial goal in Tuesday night’s Game 4 and then providing an assist on Agostino’s goal Wednesday night.
The efforts of 22-year-old goalie Ville Husso also shouldn’t go unnoticed. While he ended up giving up three goals and making the game somewhat dramatic after the Wolves got out to a 3-0 lead, he stopped 32 shots and earned the first star honors Wednesday.
Next: Blues Recall Petteri Lindbohm from AHL Chicago Wolves
With his playoff success, the young netminder is cementing himself as an intriguing depth option next year and Carter Hutton‘s likely replacement as Jake Allen‘s backup in 2018-19.