In St Louis, the Blues went 4-for-4 on their first four shots of the game on Wednesday night in a match with the visiting Chicago Blackhawks.
That was good enough to send the Blues to a 5-2 win over the Hawks.
It took all of 6:59 of the opening stanza to get the four strikes, the fastest four goals of the season in the NHL.
“That was pretty quick,” St. Louis’ Zack Bolduc said. “I didn’t know. Someone told me after the game it was four goals on four shots. … Yeah, we had a good start and I think we got a little bit sloppy in the second (period), but we found our legs back in the third.”
Jordan Kyrou hit for a double to get the outburst rolling, his first came at 2:04, scoring off a breakaway.
“Yeah, it’s a good feeling,” Kyrou said. “Obviously you can’t control the outcome of what happens to the other teams, but we can control what we do, right? That’s all we’re focused on right now.”
Kyrou collected his double at 2:46, scoring off an odd man rush to give the Blues a 2-0 lead.
“It just all happened so fast,” Kyrou said. “Just kind of just instinct.”
Torey Krug stretched the lead to 3-0 at 4:37, hitting off a shot from the point.
Zack Bolduc h finished off the first period barrage with a shot form the right side of the crease for a 4-0 lead to the Blues headed to the middle frame.
The win pushed the Blues to within three points of the Vegas Golden Knights for the second wild card in the Western Conference.
“What needs to be said? I don’t think anything needs to be said,” Chicago’s Jason Dickinson said. “It was an embarrassing first period. One shot, maybe three shot attempts, we were down 4-0. What words need to be said?”
Joel Hofer made 17 saves in the win.
St Louis improved to 42-32-5.
“Obviously we had a real good start to that game and got rewarded, broke the game open pretty quickly,” St. Louis interim coach Drew Bannister said. “Good to see our guys come out with that kind of urgency to start the game.”
“We definitely weren’t ready to compete and they showed their desperation on where they are in the standings,” Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson said of the Blues. “And unfortunately, we didn’t give Petr much help, giving him a breakaway and a 2-on-1 to start the game.”
In the middle frame, Chicago’s Philipp Kurashev closed the gap to 4-1 at 8:40, scoring off an errant puck on the right side of the crease.
Robert Thomas pushed the Blues lead to 5-1 midway through the third period, scoring off a rebound down low.
Landon Slaggert hit for his first career NHL goal at 16:51, scoring after making a rush to the net from the right wing, for the 5-2 final count on the scoreboard.
“Definitely good to get the first one out of the way,” Slaggert said. “It was a great play by Donato and [ MacKenzie Entwistle] there to give me the puck. Obviously, like you said, I wish it came in a little different fashion. … Disappointed with the outcome but happy to get the first one out of the way.”
The Blackhawks dropped to 23-50-5 off their fourth loss in six contests. 
Petr Mrazek got the start, faced three shots, yielded three goals, then took the hook for the remainder of the game.
Arvid Soderblom made 21 saves in a mop up role.
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