NHL Playoff Schedule 2016: TV Coverage, Live Stream Guide for Sunday Matchups

The St. Louis Blues have every reason to be upset prior to taking the ice at the United Center Sunday for Game 3 of their opening-round playoff series against the Chicago Blackhawks.

They have to be upset with themselves and the hockey powers that be.

After taking a 1-0 lead in the second period in Game 2 Friday night, they appeared ready to take that advantage into the locker room at the end of two periods. All they had to do was survive a late faceoff in their own zone and they would carry that advantage into the final 20 minutes.

Instead, Jonathan Toews won the draw and Patrick Kane tapped it back to Duncan Keith. The stellar defenseman let loose with a slap shot that escaped goalie Brian Elliott's vision and found the top corner. The Blackhawks tied the score with five seconds to go in the period.

That was bad; what followed in the third period was worse.

Vladimir Tarasenko, who had scored the opening goal for the Blues, appeared to give St. Louis the lead when he scored at 12:14 of the third period. Tarasenko sild a shot into the net from the slot and the St. Louis fans exploded with joy. They had taken a 2-1 lead over the hated Blackhawks and were minutes from taking a 2-0 lead in the series.

Except they weren't. 

Game	Time (ET)	Series standings	TV
St. Louis at Chicago	3 p.m.	1-1	NBC, TVAS, SN
Tampa Bay at Detroit	7 p.m.	TB, 2-0	CNBC, CBC, TVAS, FS-D, SUN
Florida at N.Y. Islanders	8 p.m.	1-1	NBCSN, SN, TVAS2, MSG+, FS-F
Nashville at Anaheim	10:30 p.m.	Nashville, 1-0	NBCSN, TVAS, SN, FS-W, FS-TN

The playoff games can be live streamed on NHL.TV.

Chicago head coach Joel Quenneville challenged the goal, arguing that Jori Lehtera had beaten the puck into the Blackhawks' zone by the narrowest of margins, making the play offsides.

Jeff Roberson/Associated Press

After a long review of a very close play, the officials determined that the Blues had been offsides and the Tarasenko goal did not count.

Tarasenko was called for a penalty shortly thereafter, and Andrew Shaw took advantage of the power play by batting a rebound past Elliott.

That goal survived a league review and a St. Louis challenge, and the Blackhawks had a 2-1 lead with less than five minutes to play.

St. Louis coach Ken Hitchcock pulled Elliott to add an extra skater, and the Blackhawks scored the clincher into the empty net. The Blues would score a second goal with less than two seconds remaining on a shot by Kevin Shattenkirk, but it was too little, too late.

The Blues have been one of the most consistent regular-season teams in the league for years, and they narrowly missed winning the Central Division this year after scoring 107 points, two fewer than the Dallas Stars.

The home loss means they have to go into the United Center and win at least one game if they are going to end their streak of losing three straight first-round series.

Whatever feelings they have of being snake-bitten must disappear before they take the ice in Chicago, because the Blackhawks are simply too good to beat if they are distracted by negative feelings.

Hitchcock would not allow any kind of self-pity after the game. 

"When you play the defending Cup champions, you're going to have to fight through a lot of stuff," Hitchcock told the media, via R.B. Fallstrom of the Associated Press (h/t CBSSports.com). "Calls aren't going to go your way, you're not going to get the officiating you want. It's always going to seem like it's one-sided. Big deal, fight through it."

Michael Ainsworth/Associated Press

The Anaheim Ducks have some serious work to do Sunday night against the Nashville Predators. Anaheim dropped the opening game of the series at home Friday night.

They want to avoid an 0-2 hole, and they must find a way to win at the Honda Center to make that happen. After playing excellent hockey throughout most of the second half of the season, the Ducks looked ordinary in losing the opening game of the series by a 3-2 margin.

James Neal scored for Nashville in the first minute of the opening period as the Ducks were simply not ready to start the game.

Anaheim would take a 2-1 lead early in the second period on goals by Ryan Getzlaf and Ryan Kesler, but Nashville dictated the pace of the game from that point forward. The Predators simply outplayed the Ducks, and when Filip Forsberg scored the go-ahead goal in the third period, the Ducks had no answers.

The Ducks may be the team with the best chance to unseat the defending champion Blackhawks because they have the size, strength and skill to battle Chicago on even terms. However, if they drop the first two games of the series at home, that opportunity will likely disappear.

The pressure is clearly on the Ducks at home Sunday night, just as it is on the Blues in Chicago Sunday afternoon.