In St Louis, the Blues’ Carter Hutton made 33 saves in a 3-1 win over the visiting Montreal Canadiens.
Goalie controversy or not, the Blues roll out Hutton and Jake Allen like a craps shooter at the tables and are winning.
“It’s a product of the team too,” Hutton said. “We’re playing well. I think I just catch everybody off guard now because I play a few more times a week than I used to. I was playing well once every two weeks. Now it’s a big deal.
“I think I’m the same goalie. I’m just playing more, to be honest, and confident in what I do.”
St Louis built a 3-0 lead off goals from Ivan Barbashev, Patrik Berglund and Alexander Steen.
“[Hutton] played very well; we had a lot of chances early and weren’t able to get one by him,” the Canadiens’ Max Pacioretty said. “Obviously they got a goal and got some momentum. We weren’t able to solve the goalie early enough to give ourselves a chance to win.”
Charles Hudon scored late for Montreal to break up the shutout bid.
“We’re not looking for moral victories, we’re looking for points. Really, what we need are answers among ourselves about how to win hockey games,” Pacioretty said.
Despite talk of a controversy in the Blues’ net this season, Hutton seems to brush that aside.
“I think we’re seeing it’s a mixture of confidence and desire to stay in there,” Blues head coach Mike Yeo said. “He’s doing a great job.”
[WATCH: All Canadiens vs. Blues highlights]
Carey Price made 28 saves to take the loss as the Habs dropped to 20-24-6.
“I think if you look at this year, the number of scoring chances we have and the amount of goals scored, it’s below norm, and that’s been the story of our season so far. We’ve just got to score and find ways and I guess finish off better than we have since the start,” Canadiens head coach Claude Julien said after the loss.
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