At the start of 2019, the St. Louis Blues' playoff hopes hadn't just expired. They were on a cold, metal table and general manager Doug Armstrong was sharpening his scalpel to see what went wrong, with rumors flying that the majority of his roster was in play for trades. He had fired coach Mike Yeo in November, after 19 games; interim coach Craig Berube had yet to crack the code on the team's lack of success.

Now? They're third in the Central Division with 69 points, as close to the second-place Nashville Predators (75 points) as they are ahead of the first Western Conference wild card, held by the Dallas Stars (63).

"It's exciting. It's fun hockey," center Ryan O'Reilly said. "You could see from the start of the year how frustrating it was. We kept working and working and not getting results. And now everyone's invested in each other. Everyone's trying to make it easier on the other guy."

How did the Blues turn it around to the point where they're on an 11-game winning streak? Here are five reasons:

When Binnington, a rookie goalie, made his first start of the season on Jan. 7, the Blues were in last place in the conference at 16-19-4 with 36 points. They're 15-3-1 since then, with Binnington going 13-1-1 in that span. He has a .937 save percentage, a 1.61 goals-against average, a .867 quality starts percentage and an 11.83 goals saved above average.

While it might seem like an adrenaline shot to the heart, Binnington has been more like an adamantium graft to their skeleton. He has given them confidence that there's a sturdy last line of defense, and that bolstered both their offense and defense. Their team save percentage under Yeo was .906, or 27th in the NHL; under Berube, it's .925, good for seventh. Since the start of 2019, the Blues are second in 5-on-5 save percentage, at .942, behind only the New York Islanders at .946.

"He's made huge strides and big saves for us," O'Reilly said of Binnington. "And when he makes a good save, we come out the next shift and don't give up anything. Earlier in the year, we were giving up a lot. Now we're making sure that one shot doesn't turn into two or three. He's doing a good job, and we're playing better in front of him."

Winning the high-danger game

If you watched the Blues earlier this season, or listened to any of the Jake Allen fans who defended the goalie's horrible stats with "it's a team problem," then you know the Blues had a bit of a defensive deficiency. As in, they were giving away odd-man rushes like they were food samples at a Costco: frequent, and plentiful.

Those Allen defenders had a point, in that the numbers for the Blues' goalies turned around as the team began better fortifying its own zone, with much better gap control around the red line and coverage in the neutral zone. By doing so, they dramatically reduced the number of quality chances their goalies were facing.

The Blues are second in the NHL in high-danger shot attempts allowed, meaning shots near the crease or around the slot, with 438 in 59 games (the Wild are the stingiest, with 416 in 60). For comparison's sake, the Islanders -- by far the best defensive team in the NHL currently, with a 2.29 goals-against average in 58 games -- have given up 489 high-danger shot attempts.

Meanwhile, the Blues are eighth in high-danger shot attempts taken (548) to give them a high-danger shot attempt percentage of 55.58, third best in the NHL.

Binnington is averaging 4.29 high-danger shots against per game, while Allen is still up at 5.50 per game. Of course, the best defense is to not allow a shot at all.

Shot suppression

Jordan Binnington has helped the Blues get back in the playoff hunt. But the team's strategy ahead of him has been critical to the netminder's success. Keith Gillett/Icon Sportswire

The Blues are averaging 28.1 shots against in 40 games with Berube behind the bench, which is a significant drop from the 30.8 they faced in 19 games of Yeo. Last season under Yeo, they averaged 29.7 shots against per game.

Why the drop? This is where we talk about one of the aspects of the Blues that has thrived under Berube, which is their forecheck. It's tenacious in a way it wasn't earlier this season. They play faster, they think faster. They're making it easier in their own zone by staying out of it. "The best defense is a good offense" is a Grade-A sports cliché -- although it's selectively applied in the Norris Trophy voting -- but it's applicable here.

The offense is cranking

The Blues are averaging 3.55 goals per game during their 11-game winning streak. Since the start of the new year, the Blues have an even-strength shooting and save percentage value of 1.032, which is second only to the Lightning, at 1.038.

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Look no further than Vladimir Tarasenko for evidence of this offensive surge. Remember a couple of months ago, when there was brief speculation that Tarasenko could be on the trade block. Well, he's Vladimir Tarasenko again. He scored two goals in 13 games in December. In his last 14 games, Tarasenko has 11 goals, four of them game-winners. Brayden Schenn had two points in 12 games near the start of the season. In his last 12 games, he has 13 points. And so on.

The constant has been O'Reilly, who hasn't gone more than three games without a point this season and has 61 points in 59 games. With the Blues back in a playoff spot, could O'Reilly get in the Hart Trophy conversation?

'Gloria!'

Obviously, when fortunes change, so do attitudes. Life gets a little more fun. The locker room sounds different. In the Blues' case, it sounds like ... disco.

In January, the Blues began blasting Laura Branigan's classic "Gloria" in the dressing room after victories. It started after Alexander Steen, Joel Edmundson, Robert Bortuzzo, Jaden Schwartz and Robby Fabbri witnessed something in Philadelphia during the Eagles' NFC wild-card game against the Chicago Bears on Jan. 6, the day before Binnington's first start.

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"We got together with some friends and watched the game with a bunch of Philly guys who grew up there," Edmundson told stlouisblues.com. "They had a DJ in the bar and whenever there was a commercial break, they would crank the tunes and all these guys from Philly would get up and start dancing around.

"They played this song 'Gloria' a couple of times, and this one guy looked at the DJ and said, 'Keep playing Gloria!' So they kept playing it. Everyone would get up and start singing and dancing. We just sat back and watched it happen. Right there we decided we should play the song after our wins. We won the next game, we got a shutout, so we just kept on playing it."