The St. Louis Blues are on a roll, but it's goaltending, not scoring, that's helped them win lately. Jake Allen made 23 saves, and Dmitrij Jaskin and Vladimir Tarasenko scored to help the St. Louis Blues defeat the Buffalo Sabres 3-0 at First Niagara Center on Thursday. Allen's third shutout of the season, fourth of his NHL career, helped the Blues (34-13-4) win their seventh straight game; they are 12-0-1 in the past 13 games. Elliott made 30 saves in a 2-1 overtime win against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday. Allen is 4-0-0 in 2015. The 13 straight games with a point set a Blues record. Allen made two saves against Sabres forward Chris Stewart, including one on a breakaway with 7:35 left in the second period, and a pad-stack save on Zemgus Girgensons after a turnover by Blues defenseman Jay Bouwmeester with 1:15 remaining in the second period that preserved a 1-0 lead. Allen stopped Sabres forward Brian Flynn twice on a shorthanded breakaway with 7:20 left in the third period. Allen assisted on Jaden Schwartz's 19th goal, an empty-netter with 1:17 left. Jaskin gave the Blues a 1-0 lead with 1:56 left in the second period when he picked up a loose puck after a shot from the blue line by Blues defenseman Chris Butler, and scored on a wraparound to beat Sabres goalie Jhonas Enroth. The play started after a faceoff win by Blues center Patrik Berglund, who returned after missing three games with an upper-body injury. Ty Rattie, who got the pass off the faceoff, passed to Butler for the setup shot. It was Rattie's first NHL point. Tarasenko made it 2-0 with 5:38 left in the third period with his 27th goal. After a turnover by Sabres defenseman Josh Gorges, Alexander Steen picked up the loose puck and passed out front to Backes, who passed to Tarasenko for the goal. Enroth made 25 saves. The Sabres (15-34-3) have lost 19 of the past 21 games.
Blues Quotes
Ken Hitchcock: "I think the last two games our goalies have been the best players. Allen] was sound again. This is now three games in a row where he's been sound. Brian [Elliott's] been good. There [are] stages in the season where you really need it and this is one of the stages where we need our goaltending. We're playing OK, but we're not playing at the level we want to see our game at. There [are] some games you need your goalie, and we've had two games in a row where we needed our goaltending. You're seeing the emergence of a real young power forward right now [Jaskin]. He's scoring a lot, he's getting a lot of scoring chances, and he’s really firm around the net right now. Good sign. The line was good, Jaskin was great. Jaskin has really played well right now. We got a good burst from Berglund. [Berglund] was a really a good player today. I think we got a great burst from [Berglund] and energy. [Tarasenko's] sense of timing is impeccable. He's a guy that needs one chance to score. He knows the score of the game. The closer the game, he seems more interested in being a difference-maker and he’s made a big difference this year."Jake Allen: "I'm trying to practice as hard as I can, especially when my starts are somewhat limited and just being ready when I get my chance. I want to make the most of every opportunity I can, and I felt since the New Year on, it's been a real fresh, good start for me. Yeah, it was good to sort of get [Stewart] there. But he had a lot of speed, so usually when guys are coming in that fast, he's going to deke, so I just got a pad on it there. I didn't really know what he was going to do first, but then he tried to settle the puck down, and I could sort of tell he was going to shoot at that point. On a breakaway, you just try to wait him out as long as you can and [I] got a stick on it."
David Backes: "It's two points in the bank on the road in the dog days of the season. We'll take it and again, we're in the midst of a pretty good run, and I think coaching staffs in general tend to push harder when you're in the midst of good runs and don't want you getting complacent. ... That's understandable and we need to push through and get our game back to where it's dominant hockey from start to finish, the way it was at the beginning of this run. When we have that, it doesn’t matter who we're playing or where we're playing, it's a tough team to play against."
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