Blues swamp Canucks, 5-1

In Vancouver, Jordan Kyrou scored the first, and final two goals of the game on Monday in a 5-1 St Louis Blues win over the Canucks.

Jordan Binnington made 33 saves in the win.

The Blues’ special teams were perfect on four penalty kills.

“The PK was really good, and [the] power play scored a couple and that’s the difference in the game,” St. Louis coach Craig Berube said. “Special teams are really important. Your special teams can win your game or lose you a game.”

The Canucks dropped to 5-9-1.

“I’m running out things to say here,” Vancouver Bo Horvat said. “Obviously another poor effort by us and that’s the result.

“We play like a completely different team on the road. I don’t know if we’re pushing too hard at home to not get booed out of our building every night. I think it’s just turning on us right now, and we’re just kind of running around with their heads cut off a little bit too much, and that’s again the result tonight. We’re sick of letting our fans down, each other down, at home.”

St Louis improved to 16-15-1.

Ilya Mikheyev was the lone striker for the Canucks, his goal tied the game, 1-1, after Kyrou had give the Blues a 1-0 lead in the middle frame.

Nathan Walker restored the lead 38 seconds later, 2-1, for St Louis.

“I just tried to find some open ice on the weak side and Leddy made a great heads-up play, and [I] just decided to grip it and rip it,” Walker said. “Whenever you get on the board and chip in it’s great, but that was right after their goal, so it obviously pulled the momentum away from them and gave it back to us.”

Robert Thomas  hit for a power play goal to send the game to the third period with the Blues up, 3-1.

“It’s like Groundhog Day,” Canucks coach Bruce Boudreau said. “We’re a fragile group and once they got the second and third in quick succession, it was like, ‘Oh no, here we go again.'”

The Canucks dropped to 13-14-3.

Kyrou finished his hat trick in the third before the midway point of the frame.

“[Kyrou] has been playing real good hockey for some time, and the goals were going to come eventually,” Berube said. “He’s too good of a player. Now he’s capitalizing, but his work ethic has been there for the whole year.”

Spencer Martin made 22 saves in the Vancouver loss.