In St Louis, the Blues raised their Stanley Cup Championship banner Wednesday night.
They followed that up by taking a 2-0 lead over the visiting Washington Capitals.
The third act of the play was a rally by the Caps for the 3-2 win in overtime.
Jakub Vrana struck for the game-winner in the extra session.
The Caps skated the puck in a series of figure eights before Vrana found an opening to the left of the cage and wristed home the winner.
“That was good patience from our zone,” Vrana said. “We really waited for the best shot to take, and then we were there for a long time, so I felt like I could use my skating and shoot the puck, so it was a good job of all three of us (John Carlson, T.J. Oshie).”
Braden Holtby picked up the win off 20 saves.
Sammy Blais scored for the Blues with just 53 seconds gone in the game and Alex Pietrangelo also scored for St Louis who were flying early.
“I liked the start, for sure,” St. Louis coach Craig Berube said. “I thought guys fed off the start of the game and what went on. After that, we weren’t the same.”
Alex Ovechkin and Dmitry Orlov rallied the Caps back from the 2-0 deficit.
“We knew there was still lots of hockey left,” Ovechkin said. “We get one and then we knew we had to get another one. And the [penalty kill] stepped up (and) did a great job. After that, we knew if we were going to take a point, it’s a good thing. We were lucky enough to get another one and get the two points.”
[WATCH: All Capitals vs. Blues highlights]
Jordan Binnington made 31 saves in the loss.
“You never like to give up a lead, let alone a 2-0 lead,” Binnington said. “But you know, we’ve just got to keep working and just stick to the game plan and have a little bit more tenacity, I guess. I think it’ll come. It was game one, a lot of emotions tonight. Not the right outcome, and hopefully we will get back at it next game.”
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