Jeff Skinner had a goal and an assist to help the Hurricanes defeat the St. Louis Blues 4-1 at Scottrade Center for their season-best fourth straight win. Brett Pesce, Brock McGinn and Riley Nash scored for the Hurricanes, and goalie Eddie Lack made 23 saves; he is 6-0-0 in his career against St. Louis (including games with the Vancouver Canucks). The win was Carolina's first here since Dec. 11, 2010, and they did it with their fathers in attendance. The dads were with the Hurricanes when they defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-2 in overtime at home on Tuesday, and they'll accompany them for a home game Friday against the Canucks.
Jori Lehtera scored for the Blues, who had a two-game winning streak end. Brian Elliott made 21 saves before he was pulled after allowing McGinn's goal 7:13 into the third period that made it 3-0. Jordan Binnington made his NHL debut and made three saves.
The Blues are missing six injured players, including goalie Jake Allen (lower body), defensemen Jay Bouwmeester (upper body), Carl Gunnarsson (upper body) and forwards Jaden Schwartz (fractured ankle), Steve Ott (hamstring) and Magnus Paajarvi (upper body). St. Louis then lost Alexander Steen after Pesce's goal 3:22 into the third period when Kevin Shattenkirk, in a bit of frustration, whipped the puck out of his goal and on the follow through hit Steen in the mouth with his stick. Steen left the ice and did not return. Hitchcock said there would be an update on Steen's condition Friday, but after the game said, "He's out right now." The Blues were 0-for-4 on the power play and generated one shot.
Skinner was in the right place at the right time after Andrej Nestrasil's shot from the slot was blocked by Vladimir Tarasenko. The puck caromed to the side of the net where Skinner was parked, and he popped the puck past Elliott 1:49 into the second period for a 1-0 lead after getting it under control by kicking it in front of him. Chris Butler's turnover on an outlet pass along the left boards was picked off in the neutral zone and led to Carolina's goal.
Pesce's power-play goal, a shot from the left point that deflected off Colton Parayko's stick through Elliott, gave Carolina a 2-0 lead. McGinn then scored off a slap shot from the left circle after the Hurricanes won an offensive-zone faceoff to make it 3-0.
Lehtera scored 20 seconds after McGinn; he followed up Joel Edmundson's shot and backhanded the rebound high into the net to make it 3-1. Nash's first goal in 31 games, a short-side wrist shot that beat Binnington off Ron Hainsey's outlet pass, came with 3:39 remaining to make it 4-1.
Blues Quotes
Ken Hitchcock: "We got nothing. We got nothing. We don't have any energy. We're running on fumes right now. You could see it five minutes into the game.
You can get upset by it, but we've got to play a game on Saturday; we've got to focus on Saturday. We've got to find some energy. Take [Friday] off, gas everything [up], get 10 minutes in on Saturday morning and put it all into Saturday night (against the Montreal Canadiens). That's what we've got. There's no point beating it down. We make so many uncharacteristic puck errors, we get beat at the puck, lost a lot of puck battles that we normally win. Not taking anything away from Carolina, but we had nothing from start to finish. We're going to have to find the energy to play on Saturday."
Alex Pietrangelo: "They were just a step ahead of us. We were slow with our puck movement. We got better as the game went on, but still not up to the way we usually play pretty fast, puck movement-wise. They out-supported us. We were just a step behind."
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