Down by two goals? No problem. Blues score three goals in 2:15 to cruise past Vegas 5-2.
Thirty six seconds into the first period the Golden Knights scored. The Knights got the puck into the zone and in behind the net. Colton Parayko had the puck for a second but lost it. The puck trickled to Alex Pietrangelo. Pietrangelo fired the puck on net. Jordan Binnington gave up a juicy rebound. Chandler Stephenson was left open alone in front. Stephenson fired the puck back on net and scored.
About seven minutes later, the Knights scored again. The Blues and Knights traded turnovers. It was the Blues turnover that would kill them though. Ben Hutton was able to make a perfect pass to Reilly Smith. Smith who was in all alone, scored five hole on Binnington. 2-0 bad guys.
The Blues answered back a few minutes later. David Perron and Ryan O’Reilly team up to cut the Vegas lead in half. Perron somehow found O’Reilly in the corner. O’Reilly then snapped a shot from a weird angle and beat Robin Lehner.
But wait there’s more! Tyler Bozak tied the game at one. Justin Faulk fired a shot on net. The shot was deflected on by Klim Kostin. While all that was going on Tyler Bozak skated behind the net and back out front. Lehner gave up a rebound that Bozak deflected off of his skate. He then shot the puck back on net and scored.
Just seconds later the Blues took the lead. Justin Faulk stole the puck and headed up ice. He was able to skate in all alone on Lehner. Faulk gave a how do you do and clanked one off the crossbar and in. Faulk scored goal number 100 of his career and just like that the Blues were up 3-2.
As mentioned above, that was three goals in two minutes and fifteen seconds. That Included two goals in 33 seconds if I can do math right.
The second period for the Blues was even better than the first. If Brandon Saad was any hotter here lately he might actually catch on fire. Saad scored a power play goal to put the Blues ahead by 2.
Craig Berube had this to say about Saad after the game…”He’s played well. Like I said, he’s got great speed, outside speed, and he’s heavy. He’s heavy on the puck. That’s two goals in a row, two power play goals in a row where he’s just battling at the front of the net and gets them.”
Nikko Mikkola scored the fifth goal for the Blues and his first of the year. The Blues came in on a two on one. Mikkola didn’t pass the puck over to his rush buddy…or rush mate or teammate or…whatever. In any event he shot the puck and scored.
The Blues take this one 5-2. After an awful start the Blues pulled their heads out of their asses and played a decent game. Final shot totals were 34-31 in favor of the Knights.
Twits and Shit.
Postgame comments from the Blues.
“Any time that you find some wins against teams that are expected to be in the top of the standings, it’s huge.”
Hear from Justin Faulk, Tyler Bozak and Craig Berube following tonight’s win vs. Vegas. #stlblues pic.twitter.com/KreZEV0YbV
— St. Louis Blues (@StLouisBlues) November 23, 2021
This is me hoping that Bortuzzo has a few more maintenance days.
Mikkola’s line: 16:38 TOI, 1G, +1, 3 hits
Berube: “He was on top of people like. He was aggressive with his skating, he scored a nice goal to get up in the play. His puck play was good tonight, moved the puck well. He was a good player.” #stlblues
— Jeremy Rutherford (@jprutherford) November 23, 2021
More Brandon Saad stats.
Pretty, pretty, pretty good. #stlblues pic.twitter.com/xAPYCpWeMJ
— Bally Sports Midwest (@BallySportsMW) November 23, 2021
Meanwhile in bizzaro world.
It’s an @Enterprise hat trick for Zach Sanford! pic.twitter.com/jg7D6N3tTo
— NHL (@NHL) November 23, 2021
Anyway, they had us in the first half, not gonna lie…I don’t know where I was going with that…goodnight and Let’s go Blues.