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WINNIPEG, Manitoba — There’s a certain allure Game 7s have, a mystique that sets them apart from all other games.

“These are the moments,” said Blues coach Jim Montgomery. “You don’t think about winning Game 1 when you’re playing in your basement or you’re playing street hockey or your playing knee hockey with your best friend or your brother, whatever the case may be. It’s Game 7, it’s overtime and it’s about us seizing an opportunity. It’s an opportunity that we’ve earned and now we have to go seize it.”

“Now it’s a one-game showdown,” said Winnipeg coach Scott Arniel. “It’s our goalie against their goalie. … It’s our best players against their best players and it’s our grinders going against theirs. It’s specialty teams, it’s D-zone coverage. It’s what we do as a group.”

The inability of either team to win on the road — or the dominance of both teams at home — is what has gotten these teams to this point. Each team has held serve by winning every game at home in this series, which means a deciding Game 7 at 6 p.m. Sunday at Canada Life Centre, which as its name implies, means this game is in Canada, which means the Blues have a lot to overcome.

“We haven’t played the way we needed to on the road in a tough building yet,” Blues captain Brayden Schenn said. “Obviously we’re going to make adjustments but there’s certain things that are giving us success on home ice and I’m sure they’ll bundle that up in video, show us, engrain it in our brain. They’re good at home, they’re a good team. It’s going to be a good challenge. Nothing comes for free, nothing’s easy but we feel confident in this group that we got some gamers in here that enjoy challenges like that.”

Without naming names, it’s clear who one of those players is: Blues goalie Jordan Binnington.

The last time the Blues played in a Game 7, it was in 2019 in Boston and the occasion was Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final. That was the second time the Blues went to seven games in that postseason, the other being against Dallas in the division finals. Binnington was in goal on both occasions. Binnington was also in goal for championship game of the 4 Nations Face-off this season. In those three games, Binnington has a .950 save percentage and a 1.10 goals-against average.

“His track record speaks for itself,” said defenseman Cam Fowler. “He was unbelievable when they won the Cup here. You saw what he could do in the 4 Nations tournament this year as a world-class goaltender, so we have all the trust and faith in him. And his demeanor, too. He’s calm, he’s collected back there. (Philip Broberg) spoke to the way he can move the puck, and how that helps us as D-men. It puts us in a lot of good situations that help us move the puck up the ice. He’s the total package. He’s a huge reason why we are where we are and we’ll continue to lean on him because he’s shown everybody time and time again that he’s world class.”

Is there a goalie he’d rather have behind him than Binnington, Schenn was asked.

“No,” he said. “I can say that fully with what he did in 2019. He’s our guy, he’s a special human and he gets up for big moments and he was great again (in Game 6).”

On the other side, there is Connor Hellebuyck, widely considered the best goalie in the game today, the heavy favorite to win the Vezina Trophy again as the top goalie, and the guy who has been pulled from three of the past four games as goals have poured into the Jets net. Hellebuyck gave up six goals in Game 3, five goals each in Games 4 and 6. Hellebuyck’s goals saved above expected at is -9.7, the worst among all postseason goalies (Binnington is eighth-best at 1.1.).

The Jets strongly defended Hellebuyck after the game, in part because the goals had other contributing factors and because starting backup Eric Comrie is not an option for the first Game 7 in Winnipeg.

“Tonight was not about Connor,” Arniel said after Game 6. “Tonight, we imploded in front of him.”

“Bucky has been phenomenal for us all year,” said Winnipeg forward Nikolaj Ehlers, who returned to the lineup in Game 6 after being out five weeks, “and he’s continued to do that. We’ve got to be better. We know when we play the right way, play well, making the right reads, we are a really good team, and we’ve shown that in this series. We’ve got to keep that up in 60 minutes.”

Hellebuyck has also been a much better goalie at home than on the road. His save percentage is .885 at home, .757 on the road. He’s allowed seven goals in Winnipeg, 16 in ӣ����Ƶ.

The Blues were also guilty in those games of not putting many shots on goal, of not testing Hellebuyck for the damaged psyche that can come when a goalie keeps fishing pucks out of the net.

Which speaks to the challenge facing the Blues if they’re to safely get their Game 6 style through Canadian customs. They have played differently, inefficiently, in Winnipeg.

“It’s just getting to our game early,” Fowler said. “I think when we’re on top of our game it’s a hard thing to defend. We try to create as much chaos as we can offensively. We’ve seen some pucks go in and I think it’s a credit to all of us, honestly, the time and the effort that we’ve put in in order to try and create chances for ourselves. We all know he’s a world-class goaltender and we have to make life as difficult on him as we can. That’s been something that we’ve tried to do and we’ve done a good job of it at home, but now we have to go on the road and try and recreate that again.”

Schenn is one of the handful of Blues still around from the Game 7 in Boston in 2019, also on the road.

“Binner won it,” he said. “Binner was unreal for us in the first. I’ve played in a couple Game 7s. You’ve got the whole hockey world glued to you and it’s going to be on us on Sunday night and I think both teams look forward to it.”