The Blues broke out their offense Sunday night in a 5-1 win over the Colorado Avalanche St Louis.
“First period today was the best period we’ve played all year,” Blues coach Ken Hitchcock. “Just our puck pursuit, our tenacity, our secondary forecheck was excellent. … Looked like a team that was right on the mark.
“We could have really put it away in the first period. When you’re drawing up the game plan, that’s exactly the way you want. I was really happy the way we played in the first period.”
WATCH: All Avalance vs. Blues highlights
Jake Allen made 22 saves to backstop the Blues to the win.
Five different Blues scored including Robby Fabbri, Jori Lehtera, Jaden Schwartz, Scottie Upshall and David Perron.
“It was a good feeling when you saw one line go out and have a great shift and we were following it and not taking any shifts off,” Fabbri said. “It was great to see us doing that for three periods.”
Semyon Varlamov started for the Avs and made 20Â saves; he was relieved to start the third period by Calvin Pickard.
“If you’re on your heels and defending all night and our compete level wasn’t quite like it needed to be, it gets pretty tough,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “You’ve got to have everybody going. Tonight we didn’t.”
Matt Duchene was the lone goal scorer for the Avs.
“You saw what happened. I gave up five goals. It is my fault; I’ll take [the blame],” Varlamov said.
In Detroit, the Edmonton Oilers defeated the struggling Detroit Red Wings, 2-1.
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored on the power play late in the second period to provide the margin of victory.
Jonas Gustavsson made 22 saves for the win.
WATCH: All Oilers vs. Red Wings highlights
Connor McDavid assisted on the game-winning goal.
“On a night where Connor was a little quiet, he still found a way to make an impact on the most important play of the game,” Oilers coach Todd McLellan said. “A lot of guys would have shot that puck.”
The Wings have lost five straight after a long winning streak and lost Sunday night to a former goalie in Gustavsson.
“Things usually even out, but so far, it has been good against Detroit,” said Gustavsson, who played for the Red Wings from 2012-15 and is 4-1-0 against them in his career. “We just tried to keep things simple, especially with the one-goal lead in the third period.”
Justin Abdelkader scored the lone Red Wings goal.
“We should have the better of it against a team that played an overtime game on Saturday,” Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill said. “We didn’t, though, and that’s a problem. They were able to batten down the hatches, and we didn’t get anything going.”
Jimmy Howard made 26 saves in the loss.
Tyler Pitlick also scored for the Oilers.
In Chicago, on a night when the Blackhawks celebrated the Chicago Cubs World Series victory, Marian Hossa scored midway through extra time to extend the Hawks win streak to six games off a 4-3 win.
“I had two or three giveaways [that shift],” Hossa said. “That doesn’t happen in a whole game. We killed the penalty in overtime, and [I was] getting a little cold sitting on the bench for a little bit longer. I jumped in there and had three giveaways, so definitely I was a little frustrated. But that was nice to end it that way.”
Scott Darling made 32 saves in a rare start for the Hawks.
WATCH: All Blackhawks vs. Stars highlightsÂ
Jonathan Toews, Artem Anisimov and Patrick Kane scored for Chicago as they three are starting to heat up as the Hawks are winning.
Gemel Smith had two goals and Tyler Seguin scored for the Stars in regulation.
“I was thinking, ‘Stay calm, stay calm, read the goalie, read the goalie.’ I kind of lost the puck there and tried to pull it back, and luckily it went in,” Smith said of his first NHL goal.
Kari Lehtonen took the loss on 31 saves.
You must be logged in to post a comment.