Winnipeg Jets @ St Louis Blues 4-5 - 03/10

There was a collective sigh of relief in the St. Louis Blues' locker room after one of the stranger goals of the season gave them a 5-4 victory against the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday. Barret Jackman broke a tie with 1:03 remaining in regulation when he shot the puck from just inside the red line, and it somehow fooled Jets goalie Ondrej Pavelec. Jackman's shot gave the Blues a victory after the Jets rallied from a 4-1 deficit in the third period to tie the game. David Backes won a faceoff back to Jackman's defensive partner Robert Bortuzzo, who immediately passed to Jackman. The veteran defenseman was aiming to throw the puck into the offensive zone and let the forwards go to work. Instead, he ended up with a game-winning goal. The Blues (42-19-5) trail the Nashville Predators by two points for first place in the Central Division and have two games in hand. St. Louis scored goals on four consecutive shots in the first and second periods. The "STL Line" had six points, giving it 17 in the past four games. Vladimir Tarasenko, Jaden Schwartz and Jori Lehtera each had a goal and an assist. Pietrangelo and Backes each had two assists for the Blues, and Brian Elliott made 12 saves. Elliott was as happy as anyone when Jackman's shot went in. The loss left the Jets (33-22-12) one point in front of the Los Angeles Kings for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference; the Kings won 5-2 at the Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday. It was the second of a four-game trip for the Jets, who won Saturday at Nashville. Andrew Ladd had a goal and an assist, and Michael Frolik, Lee Stempniak and Blake Wheeler also scored. Michael Hutchinson, who started in goal, was pulled from the game after giving up four goals on seven shots; Pavelec made 19 saves in relief. The Jets, who were 0-17-4 when trailing after two periods, scored three unanswered goals in the third to pull even at 4-4. To see it end for them in that fashion was painful, especially so late in the season when points are precious. Ladd and Stempniak scored 11 seconds apart early in the period to make it 4-3. Ladd's power-play goal at 1:34 ended the Blues' streak of 17 straight kills, and Stempniak took an Adam Lowry pass and beat Elliott under the crossbar at 1:45. The Jets tied it 4-4 on Wheeler's shorthanded goal, a slap shot from the high slot that beat Elliott high to the glove side with 5:28 left but lost in gut-wrenching fashion. Blues coach Ken Hitchcock, who win his 699th game in the NHL, was not displeased with his team after frittering away a 4-1 lead. He called Jackman's goal, "Justice. Frolik opened the scoring and extended his point streak to seven games with his 16th of the season off a flip pass from Ladd. Frolik beat Lehtera to the puck and took a wrist shot that beat Elliott five-hole 8:50 into the game for a 1-0 lead. It was the ninth straight game in which the Blues have allowed the first goal. Schwartz scored with 5:40 remaining in the period to tie the game 1-1. Then the Blues got goals from Tarasenko 31 seconds into the second to make it 2-1; Ott scored to make it 3-1 at 10:08 and Lehtera ended Hutchinson's night after finishing off a tic-tac-toe play 1:01 later to make it a 4-1 game. The Blues got the two points at the end of the night, and that's what they'll hang their hat on.

Blues Quotes

Barret Jackman: "I just tried to get the puck in and give our forwards an opportunity. It so happened their [goalie] lost track of it. We'll take it any way we can. When I threw it in there, I thought [Pavelec] was just kind of surveying the play and was just going to grab it and flip it to the side. It just kind of floated over the glove. He obviously didn't get a good look at it."
Alex Pietrangelo: "We were on the bench; we could see it. All I was saying was, 'Go in!' We knew he didn't know where the puck was. I thought it was going right in his glove. Lucky enough it changed direction. We'll take it. It's an interesting way to win a hockey game, but we'll take it. Not a good way to finish in the third period; I think we can all agree with that. Fun to watch. Two points out of first place. That's a great accomplishment right now. We've got two games in hand still [on Nashville]. Couple more home games before a really long road trip, so these next two games are really important for us."
Brian Elliott: "I would like to say I called it. I've never really screamed for a goal that we got. That was a quick, girlie, high-pitched scream I had. Not pretty, but we'll take the two points and move on, that's for sure. ... I guess my high-pitch scream tells you I didn't expect it to [go in]. Sometimes you lose the puck in the stands and you're expecting one thing, especially from [Jackman], who's kind of a 'get it deep' kind of player and you don't expect a shot from there. If you lose it in the stands, it's tough to gain it again. It's coming pretty fast. I'm assuming that's what happened. It's a tough break for him. You never want to get scored on like that."
Ken Hitchcock: "Play that good for two periods, deserve a good fate. I was really happy with the way we played in the second and third period. The hockey gods took care of us. Good for him; I'll go to church tomorrow."