Two games in and the NHL Western Conference Finals is already living up to the hype. San Jose and St. Louis split the first two games, with the Sharks pouring in six goals in Game 1 before conceding 4 to the Blues in Game 2. Both teams are coming off very dramatic second-round series and are so close to the goal they’ve been working nonstop for since the fall. Which one will prevail and represent the West in the Finals? NHL Western Conference Finals St. Louis Blues vs San Jose Sharks (Series tied 1-1) Game 3 – Wednesday, May 15 at St. Louis Time: 8:00 pm TV: NBCSN Live Stream: fuboTV (watch for free) Game 4 – Friday, May 17 at St. Louis Time: 8:00 pm TV: NBCSN Live Stream: fuboTV (watch for free) Game 5* – Sunday, May 19 at San Jose Time: 3:00 pm TV: NBC Game 6* – Tuesday, May 21 at St. Louis Time: 8:00 pm TV: NBCSN Game 7* – Thursday, May 23 at San Jose Time: 9:00 pm TV: NBCSN Both the Blues and Sharks needed all seven games to make it to this round. St. Louis prevailed over the Dallas Stars in the second overtime of Game Seven thanks to a Pat Maroon goal. Meanwhile, the Sharks edged the Colorado Avalanche, 3-2 in their deciding game in what was an intense back-and-forth series. This series promises to be a close one and could also be extended to the final game. If that’s the case, the edge might go to San Jose who owns home-ice advantage heading into the clean slate. The odds of this happening seem quite good considering the regular season meetings between these two. Both teams won a game in regulation with the Sharks nicking an overtime win in the third and final game. It should be a high scoring series with each to the league’s three top goalscorers featuring. San Jose’s Logan Couture and Tomas Hertl have nine goals apiece with St. Louis’ Jaden Schwartz having eight to his name. This is the second time in four years that these teams have met to decide who goes to the Finals. In 2016, the Sharks prevailed over the Blues, four games to two. Four wins separate both sides from a spot in the Finals. Which one will go on to play for the most iconic trophy in all of sports and which one will come up just short? It’s time to find out. We recommend interesting sports viewing and streaming opportunities. If you sign up to a service by clicking one of the links, we may earn a referral fee.<doc-sep>The St. Louis Blues, led by Ryan O’Reilly, meet the San Jose Sharks, led by Brent Burns, in Game 2 of their best of seven NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs Western Conference Finals on Monday, May 13, 2019 (5/13/19) at SAP Center in San Jose, California. The winner of the series will meet the Eastern Conference champion for the Stanley Cup title. Fans can watch the game online for free via a trial of fuboTV The Sharks lead the series, 1-0, after a 6-3 win in game one on Saturday. Here’s what you need to know: Who: St. Louis Blues vs. San Jose Sharks What: Game 2, Western Conference Finals When: Monday, May 13, 2019 Where: SAP Center Time: 9 p.m. EDT TV: NBCSN Channel finder: Verizon Fios, AT&T U-verse, Comcast Xfinity,Spectrum/Charter, Optimum/Altice, DIRECTV, Dish, Hulu, fuboTV, Sling Live stream: fuboTV (free trial) Watch all NHL Stanley Cup Playoff games on fuboTV. Get tickets to the NHL playoff games via StubHub PrimeSport and SeatGeek Lids, Get Blues, Sharks gear at Fanatics Dick’s Sporting Goods and NHL.com. Bet on the game or on the Sharks, Blues to win the Stanley Cup at DraftKings and get a free $20 bet when you sign up. Game One Recap, via the Associated Press: On a San Jose Sharks team filled with established stars, 22-year-old Timo Meier can get overlooked at times even though he scored 30 goals in the regular season. Meier showed in Game 1 of the Western Conference final that he can be a force in his own right, scoring twice and setting up one of Logan Couture's two goals with a hard hit to send the Sharks to a 6-3 victory over the St. Louis Blues on Saturday night. "He was a bull," Couture said. "When he skates and his strength, he's tough to defend. We're fortunate enough to play with him on our line, and I thought he was really, really good. Good stick, strong on pucks, you saw the talent on the one where he was able to walk around the d-man and finish. He's a really good player and he's coming into his own right now." Meier's hit on Alex Pietrangelo led to Couture's goal that opened the scoring in the first period and he then scored twice in the second to give the Sharks a comfortable lead and their third straight Game 1 win this postseason. Couture added an empty-net goal to give him an NHL-leading 11 in the postseason. Joe Pavelski and Kevin Labanc also scored for San Jose and Martin Jones made 28 saves. "We have so many great guys on this team, so many players that are just unbelievable hockey players," Meier said. "It's fun to be able to play at this time of the year, and obviously have success, that's what I'm playing for. To win a Stanley Cup." Game 2 is Monday night at the Shark Tank. Joel Edmundson, Ryan O'Reilly and Tyler Bozak scored for the Blues but the team gave little help to rookie goalie Jordan Binnington to get off to a rough start in the conference final. Binnington made 19 saves but was left exposed by his defense on numerous occasions. "There were a few too many mistakes out there," Edmundson said. "Whenever there was they capitalized on them. They really capitalized on every chance they got. That was the biggest difference of tonight's game." This series is a matchup between two franchises seeking their first championships after years of playoff disappointments. They endured tough roads to get here with the Sharks needing to win a pair of seven-game series and the Blues needing a double-overtime win in Game 7 against Dallas to make it to their fourth conference final in the past 49 years. The teams traded goals midway through the second period with Labanc converting after a turnover by Edmundson and O'Reilly answering 1:17 later with a nifty move to get around Jones and tuck a rebound into the open net. Meier then took over with his two goals in the second half of the period that gave the Sharks breathing room. His first came after Couture poke-checked Colton Parayko coming out of the zone. Meier got the puck, deked past Jay Bouwmeester and then used his quick hands to get a backhand past Binnington. "He's got some good speed. He makes some good little plays out there," Pavelski said. "Tonight it was on display for sure. When he picks it up in the neutral zone and he has the speed going, that one goal was really nice. He can definitely push the D back and generate some chances." Meier then got his first two-goal game in the postseason late in the period when he banked a pass from behind the goal line off Vince Dunn's skate and into the net to make it 5-2. Bozak scored with 6:59 left in the third for the Blues but they couldn't get any closer despite pulling Binnington with more than four minutes remaining. Couture then sealed it with an empty-netter. "We got caught in some turnovers and they capitalized on them," Blues coach Craig Berube said. "We are too spread out, during playoff time, you have to have numbers around the puck. You have to have puck support everywhere. And we didn't have enough support." Both teams expected a physical series between two teams with big players who like to get on the forecheck. That's just the way it started with the Blues delivering several hard hits in the opening period in sharp contrast to the type of series San Jose played last round against the speedy Colorado. But the Sharks turned one hit of their own into an early goal as Meier separated Pietrangelo from the puck in the neutral zone to send Gustav Nyquist in on a two-on-one. Nyquist slid the puck to Couture, who one-timed it into the open net. The Blues answered with Edmundson's goal but then committed two penalties in a span of 57 seconds after going more than 136 minutes without one in the playoffs. That gave San Jose a two-man advantage that Pavelski converted into a goal when he batted his own rebound out of midair into the net for his second goal in as many games after missing six contests following a bloody concussion. (The AP contributed to this report.)<doc-sep>Suddenly the San Jose Sharks-St. Louis Blues series holds a lot more interest to Bruins fans. With the Eastern Conference championship already secured, focus turns to the Western Conference finals, which are both tight and awash in controversy. Who’s next? Here’s all the live stream, start time, TV channel and odds info you need to catch the game. Watch: San Jose at St. Louis on fuboTV (with a free trial) Date: Friday, May 17, 2019 Where: Enterprise Center, St. Louis Time: 8 p.m. EST TV: NBCSN Series: Game 4 Odds: St. Louis -1.5 Live stream: fuboTV (free trial), NBC Associated Press Preview: Don't tell San Jose coach Peter DeBoer his Sharks have gotten lucky during their playoff run. "It irks me when you use words like that because this is a team that we've played four or five elimination games, not moments, games, 12 to 15 periods of elimination hockey against Vegas and Colorado," DeBoer said. "I think it's a ridiculous statement." Ridiculous or not, the Sharks have had their fair share of puck luck during their run. The latest example came Wednesday night on Erik Karlsson's game-winning goal against St. Louis in overtime. The officials missed a hand pass by Timo Meier, who used his right hand to knock the loose puck toward the front of the net where a quick pass set up Karlsson for his second goal of the game. The Sharks take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven Western Conference final into Game 4 Friday night. Meier was even given an assist on the play though his stick never touched the puck. "It's a fast game," Meier said. "I went down on the ice. I got cross-checked after the puck was in the air so I was on the ice, looked up and the puck was in the net and I saw the guys celebrating." For all the frustration among the Blues and their long-suffering fans, the play was not subject to review. "Those things happen so quickly on the ice, there's so many bodies flying around and there's split-second decisions and it's easy when you guys sit there and look at a TV monitor and criticize and hold people accountable for errors that happen in milliseconds," DeBoer said. "We've had calls go against us, we've had calls go for us and we're still standing. For anybody to minimize that is disrespectful to our group and what we've done." Sharks forward Logan Couture, whose goal with 61 second left in the third period sent the game to overtime, said such calls are part of the game. "Right now, we've got some in big areas of games, but there's some throughout those games that go against us as well," Couture said. In the first round, San Jose trailed Vegas 3-0 in the third period of Game 7 before scoring four times during a five-minute power play stemming from a controversial major penalty called against the Golden Knights. In the next round, a tying goal by Colorado was waved off in Game 7 on an offside challenge involving Gabriel Landeskog, who was leaving the ice on a line change. The latest call may have had the most impact simply because it ended the game. Unlike Vegas or Colorado, the Blues had no time to recover. The call was so egregious that multiple sports books in Las Vegas offered refunds, called a "Good Karma Payout," to betters who took the Blues on Wednesday. "The combination of a clear hand pass and an unreviewable play made this a pretty easy decision," PointsBet CEO Johnny Aitken said in a statement. "The Sharks have been the beneficiary of a few questionable calls throughout the playoffs, which probably only further incensed Blues backers." The Blues themselves said they were more interested in looking ahead. "It's a test, that's how you look at it," coach Craig Berube said. "It's a tough place, a tough call, but it's just a test and, again, we've been tested over and over throughout the season and the playoffs and we're pretty good at bouncing back. It's a mental thing." Berube noted the team had a chance to end the game in regulation, but did not. “We need to move on after this decision,” Blues forward Vladimir Tarasenko said. “It’s not going to change anyways. We have an option to discuss about it for the next few days and be not ready for the next game or just step over it and I know we’re down in the series but we have a chance to tie it again. We just have to focus on ourselves.”<doc-sep>
ST. LOUIS — Jordan Binnington made save after save to pull off yet another playoff victory — and make some team history — for the Blues. The rookie goalie stopped 29 shots to set a franchise record with his 10th post-season win this year and St. Louis edged the San Jose Sharks 2-1 on Friday night to even the Western Conference final at two games apiece. "He’s been dynamite back there for us all year and his first game he came in and had a goose egg and just took over from there," Blues defenceman Colton Parayko said of Binnington. "It’s been fun to watch. "He’s just doing his thing." Binnington moved past Brian Elliott (2016) and Roman Turek (2001) for the most wins by a Blues goalie in a single playoffs. He is the 10th rookie netminder to win at least 10 games in a single post-season in league history. "It’s a great honour," Binnington said. "Obviously, I’m having a lot of fun back here playing with this team. They’re doing a great job. They limited chances tonight. They played a complete game and I just tried to do my job." Tyler Bozak and Ivan Barbashev scored in the first period for the Blues, giving Binnington all the scoring he needed. Tomas Hertl scored for the Sharks, and Martin Jones made 20 saves. Game 5 is in San Jose on Sunday. Barbashev gave the Blues a quick lead when his shot deflected off of Gustav Nyquist’s stick and into the net just 35 seconds in. Alexander Steen’s hip check of Brent Burns behind the Sharks’ net created a turnover that led to Barbashev’s first career playoff goal. There have been seven goals scored in the opening minute of playoff games this year, with three of them coming against San Jose – the most since the Boston Bruins allowed four during their Stanley Cup run in 2011. "We’ve got to be more ready at the start of the game, for sure," Jones said. "With the way the last game ended, we should have known how they were going to come out and we were just a little more casual at the start of the game." The Blues needed just 9 seconds to convert on a power play as Bozak’s shot found its way through several skates and past Jones to make it 2-0 with 2:07 left in the first. "We kind of were stressing we’ve got to get more pucks on net with traffic and we were just kind of passing it around the outside a little too much," Bozak said. "Great shot by Vlady (Tarasenko) and Patty (Maroon) got a tip. Just a loose puck in front and I got kind of lucky that it ended up on my stick and went in." San Jose tilted the ice in its favour in the second period, but Binnington stopped all 11 shots the Sharks sent his way. Burns had the Sharks’ best chance, hitting the crossbar with about three minutes left in the period. "I thought that they came out hard in the second and obviously had some offensive zone time on us," Blues coach Craig Berube said. "We’ve got to do a better job of not allowing them to take control of the game that way. I thought the second period, we just sat back too much. We didn’t play aggressive enough in the second period." Hertl banged home a rebound off of a slap shot by Burns on the Sharks’ second power play of the game at 6:48 of the third period to cut the Blues’ lead to 2-1. The goal snapped San Jose’s scoreless streak of 226 minutes, 48 seconds in Game 4s this post-season after being shut out in the first two rounds. Jones stopped the last 13 shots he faced to keep the Sharks close. "It was a tough first (period), obviously," Burns said. "After that, I think we battled back there, had some good looks. I think we got better. We’re going to have to have better. That’s a great team over there. Still looking for a solid 60, I think." KARLSSON’S HEALTH One major concern for the Sharks is the status of star defenceman Erik Karlsson, who was sidelined during part of the third period with an undisclosed injury. He left the ice midway through the period and missed some key shifts before returning in the closing minutes when San Jose tried to tie it with an extra skater.