There’s no shortage of buzz around Tynan Lawrence right now, and for good reason. The 18-year-old has opened his NCAA season with seven goals and 10 points in eight games, a start that turns heads fast and naturally gets people thinking about the St. Louis Blues and how soon they might want him in the NHL.
But the more important question is whether they should rush it. The answer, at least from the Blues’ side, looks like no. Lawrence is still early in his development, and unless he were so advanced that college hockey had nothing left to offer him, the safer play is to let him keep growing where he is.
That’s the trap with top prospects: the urge to fast-track them before they’re truly ready. Sometimes it works.
Sometimes it doesn’t. And for St.
Louis, that gamble carries real risk. The source points to a couple of recent examples - the Boston Bruins bringing up James Hagens and the Philadelphia Flyers doing the same with Porter Martone.
Hagens has produced six goals and 12 points in 16 games for Boston, while Martone has three goals and eight points in 17 games, a line that looks especially modest next to the kind of spring he had.
Lawrence could go either direction. He could follow the Hagens path or the Martone one. That uncertainty is exactly why the Blues don’t need to force the issue.
There’s no real opening that demands it, either. If St.
Louis had major holes at center and Lawrence was obviously NHL-ready, the conversation would be different. But with Robert Thomas and Mason McTavish driving the top six, the club isn’t in a spot where it has to lean on him now.
That also gives Lawrence room to keep building in college, and Dalibor Dvorsky has only added more time to that runway. The focus for now is simple: growth. Lawrence has already shown he can take another step, and if the Blues stay patient, that patience could end up paying off in a big way later on.
In Other News...
Blues Let A Winnable Game Slip Away In One Familiar Area
A chance to extend a promising run slipped away in New York, where the Blues fell 3-1 to the Rangers and missed out on a third straight win. Pius Suter provided St. Louis only goal, and the game had enough moments to suggest the Blues could have gotten more out of it if a few key plays had gone their way.
Instead, the familiar sore spot showed up again. St. Louis went 0-for-6 on the power play, a costly blank in a game where Jordan Hofer did his part with 28 saves on 30 shots, only to be outdone by Rangers goalie Dylan Garand. For a team trying to build momentum, leaving that many chances on the table made the loss feel especially frustrating. [Read more 🡒]
Blues Offense Showing A Playoff Problem Fans Cant Ignore
Offense has been a nagging issue for the Blues over their last five games, and the uneven production is starting to look less like a short-term slump and more like a problem that could matter when the games get tighter. St. Louis has scored 10 goals in that span, with most of the damage coming in two wins, while Philip Broberg and Robert Thomas have done much of the heavy lifting for a lineup that has not gotten enough from the rest of its forwards.
The power play has also gone quiet, which only adds to the concern because playoff teams usually need a reliable way to generate offense when five-on-five play tightens up. The Blues still have enough talent to score in bunches, but the recent inconsistency is the kind of trend that can linger if they do not find more answers soon. [Read more 🡒]
Blues Keep Hitting The Same Wall And Montgomery Knows It
The Blues have spent much of the past three seasons running into the same frustrating checkpoint: the chance to turn a good stretch into a real run, only to come up short when a third straight win is on the line. Even with injuries and roster turnover, St. Louis has generally played solid hockey, but the club still has not found a way to string together the kind of momentum that changes a season.
Jim Montgomery has noticed the pattern, and he knows it is more than just bad timing. The issue, from his view, comes back to a sharper commitment to the teams identity and the edge that has to show up night after night if the Blues are going to break through this wall and start building longer winning streaks. [Read more 🡒]