These are heady times for the Blues.

The team reached its All-Star break with 65 points, the second-highest total in the NHL. The Blues don’t play again until a week from Friday, giving all their battered players a chance to heal.

Goaltenders Jaroslav Halak and Brian Elliott are both starring. The defensive corps is back to full strength, allowing youngsters Ian Cole and Cade Fairchild to develop down at Peoria.

Key forwards Alex Steen and Andy McDonald should return from their concussions at some point after that break, bolstering the team’s speed, scoring punch and depth.

“We’ve improved game to game, week to week all season long,” Blues captain David Backes observed after his team gained a point in the shootout loss to Pittsburgh on Tuesday night. “We’re in a spot where we’d like to end the season.”

But . . .

The heaviest lifting is still ahead for the Blues. Their post-break schedule turns difficult, featuring lots of road challenges and games bunched in short spans.

“We have to make sure we don’t have any drop-off,” Backes said. “Teams like Pittsburgh, like Detroit, like Chicago, teams that are in the playoffs consistently, after the All-Star Break they ramp it up. We need to not just match that, but ramp it up ourselves.

“We need to push ourselves to separate from the teams below us and hunt some of the teams that are ahead of us.”

As the playoff race intensifies, the Blues must elevate their game. Fortunately, there is ample room for improvement.

Here is their checklist:

• Get center Patrik Berglund up to full speed. He scored twice against the Penguins, demonstrating the offensive jump coach Ken Hitchcock wants to see nightly. "I thought the weight of the world went off his shoulders when he scored that goal," Hitchcock said in his postgame news conference. "He was a threat every shift. He plays like that coming back from the break, he'll be a tough player to play against."

• Get power forward Chris Stewart going, too. He took some notable shifts Tuesday night. Big, skilled and rugged wingers are hard to find. The Blues need to get their big guys rolling — Stewart in particular.

• Add scoring. If Steen and McDonald return to the lineup, stay healthy and play to their usual high level, the Blues will be able to roll four lines and sustain pressure. But Hitchcock is weary of discussing their comebacks from concussions. "To me, it's coming back and staying in," he said. If these comebacks fail, GM Doug Armstrong must find supplemental help. Top-line scorers may hit the trade market, but they will either carry massive contracts (Jeff Carter) or massive expectations (Zach Parise) in pending free agency.

• Convert a deeper offensive attack into more consistent production with the man advantage. Changes in personnel and scheme may be necessary. "The one thing we have to fix is the power play," Hitchcock said. "Coming back from the break, we have to decide which way to go. We have one unit kind of working. If that unit gets shut down, there is nothing else coming."

• Score at a higher rate during shootouts. Somehow, some way the Blues must improve. "That's an area of the game where if we're a little better, we're in first place with some room below us," Backes said. Players can work on their breakaway skills daily, but they can also over-analyze their shootout failure and compound their problems.

• Become more disciplined while sustaining their physical play. Hitchcock wants his team maintaining robust in-your-face pressure while playing the "200-foot game," but the team can't afford to take the sort of penalties that sunk it in Detroit.

• Play even harder than they have to this point. "The last two games are eye-openers," Hitchcock said. "We are as good or better than 22 teams in the league. There are eight other teams out there that are big-time teams and we get a lot of them (down the stretch). We get lots of them and we get them in their buildings."

Hence the need to improve.

“If we want to beat these teams and if we want to become a top team, we have to grow,” Hitchcock said. “We have as much room to grow from within as any team in the West.

“There is a whole other level. You watch these veteran teams that have been through the wars before, they will go to another level. We are going to have to find a way to climb into that level.”