W2W4: San Jose Sharks at St. Louis Blues, Game 5

2:28 PM ET

ST. LOUIS — A potentially pivotal Game 5 awaits in the Western Conference finals Monday night at 8 p.m. ET between the San Jose Sharks and St. Louis Blues. Here’s what to watch for:

Backes and Fabbri back in?

Blues forwards David Backes and Robby Fabbri are gametime decisions. Backes didn’t play after the first period in Saturday’s Game 4, while Fabbri took only two shifts in the third period. Neither took part in St. Louis’ morning skate Monday.

“We’re going to dress the same lineup for warmup that we did the last game; we had two extra forwards, one extra D. No changes,” Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said after the morning skate. “All those players are there. They’ll dress for warmup and then we’ll run a further evaluation after warmup.’’

That’s a fancy way of saying both Backes and Fabbri will take part in the warmups, the Blues will see how they feel and then make a decision as to whether they’ll play Monday night.

Scottie Upshall told reporters, however, that while he’s taking part in warmups on Monday night that he’s not playing in Game 5. So that would suggest at least Fabbri or Backes might be able to go.

Can Sharks bounce back — again?

If recent history in these playoffs suggest anything, it’s that the Sharks will be much better Monday night after a lackluster performance in Game 4.

When the Los Angeles Kings won their one and only game in the opening round, cutting San Jose’s series lead to 2-1, there were questions about whether history was repeating itself. (The Sharks infamously blew a 3-0 series lead to L.A. in 2014.) But this time, San Jose responded with a very strong Game 4 victory.

When the Sharks lost in Nashville in Game 6, it again revived the narrative of the past playoff failures. The Sharks responded with a monster Game 7 …

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