Blues Top Avalanche 7-3
The official game recap COlorado Avalanche vs St. Louis Blues.The St. Louis Blues cooled off the Colorado Avalanche.
The Avalanche entered the game as the surprise team of the NHL season, winning 14 of 17 games for 28 of a possible 34 points. But they were overrun by a Blues team that is now 4-0-1 in its past five games. T.J. Oshie had a career-best four assists, Alexander Steen scored his League-leading 15th and 16th goals and the Blues defeated the Avalanche 7-3 on Thursday night at Scottrade Center.
Oshie had his first career four-point game, David Backes and Derek Roy each had a goal and two assists, and Vladimir Tarasenko and Alex Pietrangelo had two points apiece for the Blues (12-2-3), now 7-1-1 in their past nine games. Jaroslav Halak stopped 21 shots, helping the Blues beat the Avalanche for the fifth straight time at home.
The seven goals matched the Blues' season-high output in a 7-0 victory against the Florida Panthers on Oct. 5.
Nathan MacKinnon, Matt Duchene and Ryan O'Reilly scored for the Avalanche (14-4-0), and Jean-Sebastien Giguere and Semyon Varlamov combined for 22 saves. Varlamov replaced Giguere for the second period and allowed two goals on six shots before Giguere returned to the game at the start of the third period.
The Avalanche lost back-to-back games for the first time this season -- they lost 2-1 against the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday. The seven goals allowed are a season high.
Roy started the onslaught 1:54 into the game with a power-play goal, the first allowed by the Avalanche in 21 attempts on the road this season. He tipped T.J. Oshie's wrist shot from the top of the left circle past Giguere for a 1-0 lead. It was the ninth straight game the Blues scored the first goal and 14th time in 17 games overall.
Colorado got even at 5:30 when MacKinnon, the top pick in the 2013 NHL Draft, beat Halak from the right circle for a power-play goal. The goal extended Paul Stastny's point streak to five games [three goals, two assists] and it was the 17th assist and 27th point of his career against the Blues in 22 games.
St. Louis blew the game open by outscoring the Avalanche 4-0 in the second period that featured a plethora of penalties and featured a trio of fights.
Backes gave the Blues the lead for good with his first goal in 10 games when he slammed a shot top shelf past Giguere at 2:49 for a 2-1 lead.
Steen's first of the game put the Blues up 3-1 at 7:16. The Blues' top line outworked the Avalanche in its end, and Backes fed a backhand to Steen, whose high slap shot beat Giguere and triggered the goalie change. Giguere, who entered the game with a 5-0-0 record and had allowed five goals on 165 shots, wound up allowing five goals on 23 shots.
The goal extended Steen's NHL-leading point streak to 12 games, during which he has 11 goals and four assists. The last Blue to have such a streak was Keith Tkachuk during the 2002-03 season.
Tarasenko scored his sixth of the season when he raced to a puck in the Colorado zone and beat Varlamov with a slap shot top shelf at 12:09 for a 4-1 lead. Chris Steward made it 5-1 at 14:39 with the Blues' third power-play goal on four tries. He collected Kevin Shattenkirk's shot from the high slot and lifted a backhand over Varlamov. It was Shattenkirk's 10th point in his past 10 games.
Stewart then squared off against Colorado's Cory Sarich at 16:46. The Blues' Vladimir Sobotka took on Matt Duchene 40 seconds later and Ryan Reaves scrapped with Colorado's Cody McLeod with 33 seconds left in the period.
Steen and Jay Bouwmeester scored against Giguere in the third. Duchene and Ryan O'Reilly had goals for Colorado.
The Avalanche returns home to face the Florida Panthers on Saturday.
-- by NHL.com --
Eurolanche.com, Worldwide, eurolanche@eurolanche.com
15/11/2013 - 11:00
