Good morning. Back at it after a travel day ...

Reading Time 5 Minutes:

1. Good win for Mizzou at Oklahoma. I don't care that the Tigers had a close call, winning by 3, after building a 10-point lead in the second half. I try to avoid nitpicking road wins, which aren't easy to get. I can't help but remember MU's mostly awful play on the road last season; they went 1-7 in Big 12 play and were outscored by 66 points. This season Mizzou is 4-2 on the road with a point differential of minus 11 and has pulled out close wins at a couple of tough venues, Baylor and Iowa State.

The Tigers are shooting .471 in conference road games this year compared to .439 last season and have improved on their assist-turnover ratio and rebounding margin in Big 12 road play.

Two problems: Mizzou has made only 29.2 percent of 3-point shots in Big 12 road games. Their two-point percentage of .564 is simply outstanding. Perhaps better shot selection would help. The other road issue is getting stops on defense. MU hasn't played defense nearly as well on the road compared to home. In the six games, Big 12 home teams have shredded the Tigers for an overall .506 shooting percentage that includes 42 percent from 3-point range. That's just as bad as last season -- and maybe worse, considering that Big 12 home teams made 39.5 percent of their 3s against Mizzou last season and are hitting 42 percent so far this season. The Tigers have to tighten up their defense when away from Mizzou Arena.

2. What should we make of Mizzou's close wins? Four of the Tigers' last five wins have come by three points or fewer. We can look at it as a sign that the grind of the season is catching up to a tenacious but undermanned team that uses only seven players. But I don't see it that way, at least not entirely. Is fatigue a factor? Well, it has to be, at least to an extent. But here's my takeaway: I think it's positive to see the Tigers winning the close ones. It's positive to see the Tigers handle negative in-game situations and recover to find a way to win. This isn't supposed to be easy, and Mizzou has demonstrated an admirable survival skill so far. And that can only harden a team for NCAA Tournament play, when so many games go down to the wire.

3. We've all talked plenty about the Blues' struggle to score goals. But let's narrow that a bit. Going forward, the team's biggest concern is the inability to score on the road. The problem is getting worse instead of better. Going into Tuesday's game at Ottawa, the Blues rank 29th among the NHL's 30 teams with an average of 1.95 goals per road game. But the average is even lower, 1.85 goals per road game -- since Ken Hitchcock took over as coach on Nov. 8. The Blues are also last in the NHL in road shooting percentage at 6.4 pct. The number is only 5.8 percent under Hitchcock.

The average of 1.95 goals per road game would be the lowest, the worst, in Blues franchise history. That distinction currently belongs to the 1967-68 Blues, who averaged 2.0 goals per road game. 

With an 8-11-3 road record, the Blues are wasting very good goaltending and tight defense. Their average of giving up 2.32 goals per road game ranks 5th in the NHL, and the road save percentage (.916) ranks ninth.

The frustrating thing is, the Blues generate plenty of chances on the road. They rank 6th in the NHL in shots per game with an average of 30.7 shots per road game. The figure is 31.9 shots per game with Hitchcock as coach. So even though the Blues have increased their number of scoring chances, they are scoring less. That's got to change for the better at some point, right? Hope so, given the fact that the Blues will play 19 of their final 31 regular-season games away from Scottrade.

4. While we're on the subject, here are the five-lowest scoring Blues teams (home and away) in the 44-season history of the franchise:

* 2003-2004 Blues, 2.33 goals per game.

* 2005-2006 Blues,  2.35 goals per game.

* 1967-68 Blues,  2.39 goals per game.

* 1977-78 Blues,  2.44 goals per game.

* 2010-2011 Blues, 2.45 goals per game through 50 games.

5. It's a positive sign that the CVC and the Rams are coming up with an agreement that will permit the team to play a regular-season single home game in London in each of the next three seasons. It's an indication of a spirit of cooperation between the two entities. As I've written and said before: there's a lot of hard work going on behind the scenes to come up with a solution to the overall lease agreement at the Edward Jones Dome. There's still a lot of work to do.

Thanks for reading...

— Bernie