Dallas 3, at St. Louis 2 (OT): Cody Eakin scored at 2:58 of overtime and the Stars beat the Blues to tie their Western Conference series at two games each.
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“I said, ‘It’s time for us to man up, ‘ and we did”, coach Lindy Ruff said. I thought Jamie Benn was great again, and I thought some young guys played really well.
“When we get away from our building, I think we play a simple game”, Brouwer said.
If you had only watched the first period of the Dallas Stars and St. Louis Blues game five matchup on Saturday, you probably would have been convinced that the Stars would grab their third win and be one win from closing out the series.
Patrick Sharp set up the victor and also scored for the Stars, coming off a 6-1 loss in Game 3. “It just opened up”. If you look at the shots and attempts, there were some pucks that were sitting there that we didn’t quite get to. “That’s how close it was”. “A little bit of a rough start, we gave up a couple of doozies to Tarasenko, but after that, it was a heck of a game”.
The Blues actually scored first when backchecking Dallas forward Brett Ritchie kicked Robbie Fabbri’s intended pass for Troy Brouwer past his own goalie, Kari Lehtonen, at the 6:00 mark.
Blues coach Ken Hitchcock suggested he’d tap into his depth for some fresh legs with the potential to play three games in five days and the choice of Jaskin paid off. Paul Stastny also scored off a deflection from Tarasenko.
“We didn’t bury them when we had the chance. We let them off the mat with those two quick goals”. “They were playing pretty good shutdown with the 1-0 lead … so that was a big goal by Faks”, Eakin said.
The Stars were able to come back from the rough start on a pair of mistakes by the Blues early in the second period.
Hitchcock didn’t seem eager to heap criticism on rookie defnseman Joel Edmundson after Edmundon’s critical turnover in the second period Thursday led to a big goal by the Stars’ Faksa. The Blues advanced, but failed at an opportunity to put the Stars in a 3-1 hole.
Protecting a two-goal lead in Game 5 at Dallas on Saturday, the 31-year-old Elliott came up big when needed.
“We’ve been a real good team when we’ve been backed into a corner”, Ruff said. “Not a lot of difference”.
Melker Karlsson added a late goal and Martin Jones made 24 saves to give the home team its fifth straight win in this series. Both teams just looked slow and sloppy. They are 5 for 15 on the power play in the past three games after going 1 for 3 on Thursday. Not even three minutes in, Cody Eakin ended the game by sneaking one over Elliott’s right shoulder and under the crossbar.
The Predators killed off six penalties, including one shortly before Fisher’s winning goal at 1:03 a.m. Goalie Pekka Rinne made 44 saves.
The Penguins got a power-play goal of their own, their first of the series, from Chris Kunitz but couldn’t overcome the Capitals’ desperation and Holtby’s brilliance.
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“We’re all tied up here and we’ve got to put this one behind us like we put the other ones behind us”, Blues captain David Backes said after the Game 3 defeat.
