In Washington, DC, the St Louis Blues trailed, briefly, in the first period by a 2-1 count. They reeled off four unanswered goals to down the Capitals on Tuesday night, 5-2.
Ville Husso made 19 saves in the Blues win.
“Every game’s important,” St Louis’ Brandon Saad (goal) said. “Every team in our division is battling for positioning. For us, it’s just controlling what we can and winning hockey games. Playoff hockey starts now.”
St Louis improved to 35-18-9.
Evgeny Kuznetsov and Tom Wilson scored for Washington in the first period.
“I think overall, in all three zones, we weren’t good enough,” The Caps’ Nicklas Backstrom said. “It starts from the back end, and we weren’t good enough there and then a lot of turnovers and a lot of odd-man rushes. So, I think that’s an area that we’ve got to clean up too if we want to be a great team.”
The Capitals dropped to 35-20-10.
Ryan O’Reilly started the four-goal splurge by the Blues, his strike tied the game, 2-2 after the first period.
“We gave up way too much in the first period,” Capitals coach Peter Laviolette said. “Too many mental mistakes, too many sloppy mistakes.”
Nathan Walker hit for a goal in the middle frame to give the Blues a 3-2 lead.
“He’s been outstanding all year for us the way he comes in and just buzzes and makes an impact,” O’Reilly said of Walker. “That was a huge goal, just going to the net hard and getting rewarded for it.”
Brayden Schenn added a a goal in the second period for a 4-2 lead to the Blues.
“Some of those better teams, it’s hard to chase the games against teams like that,” Wilson said. “But I thought we were in it and then they got a couple of quick ones and kind of took the wind out of our sails a little bit.”
David Perron added an empty-net goal for the 5-2 final.
Vitek Vanecek made 33 saves in the Caps loss.
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