In St Louis, the Blues committed 16 giveaways on Tuesday night to the visiting Florida Panthers.
It is hard to find a path to a win when you give the puck away so many times. The Panthers took advantage in a 5-1 win.
The game was tight, 2-1 , for the Panthers headed to the third period when they hit for three unanswered markers in the frame for the 5-1 final count on the scoreboard.
Matthew Tkachuk hit for a hat trick in the win.
“It felt amazing,” Tkachuk said of his fifth NHL hat trick. “I said it this morning, I scored a lot of goals in this rink when I was younger, (but) I haven’t scored much at the NHL level, so I’m glad I was saving them up for tonight.”
Anthony Stolarz made 29 saves in the win.
“I don’t think any of it was easy for us,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said of the team’s four-game roadie. “We had no legs, so we had to make a whole bunch of mental adjustments as the game went on. Part of it was just what it’s going to look like. I’m really happy with this win as much as any win we’ve had on this trip for sure.”
The Panthers improved to 26-12-2.
Brayden Schenn was the lone striker for the Blues, his first period goal at 3:24 gave the Blues a 1-0 lead.
“I actually feel we deserved better offensively,” Schenn said. “We had some looks, power play had some looks and the goalie made some saves, but then in saying that, third period, I don’t think we were assertive enough, hungry enough to play with it in their end more and it resulted in them spending time on our own end and getting deflections and goals and before we know it, the game’s out of reach.”
The Blues dropped to 20-18-1, snapping a two-game win streak.
“For me personally, I’ve been in this league a long time, nothing comes for free and sometimes you have to battle a little bit of adversity,” Schenn said. “The only way to get through it is to work your way out of it, and that’s doing extra and the little things to try and help. Hopefully this is a start where I can help guys like [Robert Thomas] and [Pavel Buchnevich] and stuff like that.”
The Panthers replied to the deficit with goals from Kevin Stenlund at 15:56 of the opening stanza, and Sam Reinhart at 1:11 of the middle frame for a 2-1 lead.
Reinhart scored off the power play for his 14th such goal of the campaign.
The Blues were scoreless in four power play chances.
“Yeah, it has to be a difference,” Blues coach Drew Bannister said of special teams. “Good teams in this league are able to, whether it’s separating games, whether it’s to tie games up when they’re down, they find ways to score goals, to give them energy on the bench. And not saying we’re not getting any energy off our power play, but we have to get our power play in the right mindset that when they step on the ice, they’re going to be difference-makers for us. That’s what we need from those guys. They are difference-makers, they’re our best players and they have to make a difference when they go on the ice.”
Tkachuk potted his natural hat trick in the third when he scored at 2:18 for a 3-1 lead, at 5:57 for his double and 4-1 advantage, and with 57 seconds left for the hat trick.
“Our team is rolling pretty well right now,” Tkachuk said. “This was actually a very hard game for us considering we had a few days off in Vail [Colorado], a long road trip out West, and we just grinded it out. It’s a good win to show us how we can win in a game when you’re feeling like that against a good team.”
Joel Hofer made 26 saves in the loss.
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