In St Louis, Kevin Hayes scored his first two goals of the season, and first with the Blues, in a 4-1 win over the visiting New Jersey Devils.
“Definitely relieved,” Hayes said. “I feel like I haven’t really got too many looks this season. I’ve been working on it, but it’s nice to actually see one go in. It felt good.”
Jordan Binnington made 33 saves in the solid win for St Louis.
“Yeah, big game at home … a chance to get us moving in the right direction,” Binnington said. “It was a hard-fought game. That’s a good team over there. I think we made a lot of big plays. Guys stepped up and kind of trusted each other, trusted the system. All around, it’s a good victory.”
After a scoreless first period, Jake Neighbours staked the Blues to a 1-0 lead in the eighth minute of the middle frame.
“It was a good forecheck and they turned it over,” Neighbours said. “We quick-upped it, [Oskar Sundqvist] made a great play to [Sammy Blais] and ‘Blaiser’ an even better play to me. My job was just to put it in the back of the net. Great play there.”
Hayes pushed the lead to 2-0 midway through the second.
“I think everyone was trying to do that tonight,” Hayes said. “It was key for our team to get to the net, winning our net battle. I thought we did a good job of that.”
New Jersey got on the board at 16:39 of the second when Curtis Lazar put up a marker to trim the deficit for New Jersey to 2-1.
“We can’t be winning games 5-4, 5-3,” New Jersey’s Kevin Bahl said. “We’ve got to win them 2-1, 1-0 now. We’ve just got to be better all around.”
New Jersey dropped to 6-3-1.
The loss ended a three-game win streak.
In the third period, both clubs skated to a draw until the Blues hit two empty nets.
Hayes scored first at 18:23 for a 3-1 advantage.
New Jersey’s Jack Hughes left the game in the first period after crashing into the end boards, it was an apparent upper-body injury.
“It’s tough,” Lazar said. “You look at the start he’s had, I’m not going to lie, we were a little dejected when it happened. But, again, you’ve got to kind of turn the page when you realize he’s not coming back and say, ‘All right, next man up.’ We have a lot of skill in this room. We’re getting tested early here, but I have full belief in this dressing room.”
Robert Thomas added the second empty-net strike with nine seconds left on the game clock for the 4-1 final.final.
Akira Schmid made 31 saves in the loss.
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