Blues hold on after fast start to sweep past Lightning
Vladimir Tarasenko capped St. Louis' three-goal surge in 75 seconds as the host Blues completed a season sweep of the Tampa Bay Lightning with a 4-3 victory on Saturday.
Robert Thomas and Alexander Steen also scored in the first period, and Brayden Schenn tallied in the second for the Blues, who improved to 4-0-1 in their last five games. Rookie Jordan Binnington finished with 39 saves.
Brayden Point scored his team-leading 40th goal and Alex Killorn and Steven Stamkos also tallied for the Lightning, whose seven-game winning streak came to an end. Tampa Bay remained four wins shy of Detroit's NHL record of 62 victories in 1995-96 with six contests to go.
The Blues found their offense early on Saturday after requiring overtime to snap a scoreless tie in a 1-0 win over the Lightning on Feb. 7.
Defenseman Vince Dunn's shot produced a juicy rebound for Thomas, who deposited a loose puck into the net from the right doorstep to open the scoring 11:30 into the first period.
Steen doubled the advantage 38 seconds later after diving to shovel the puck past Andrei Vasilevskiy (22 saves), and Ryan O'Reilly set up Tarasenko at the doorstep to give St. Louis a 3-0 advantage with 7:15 remaining in the period.
Killorn made a shifty move to get Binnington off line to put Tampa Bay on the scoreboard with a short-handed goal 27 seconds into the second period, and Point redirected Ryan McDonagh's feed to trim the deficit to 3-2 nearly seven minutes later.
Schenn regained the Blues' two-goal advantage exactly seven minutes later as he skated around the extended right pad of Vasilevskiy and backhanded the puck around his own leg and into the net.
Stamkos' wrist shot from the slot brought Tampa Bay within one at 4-3 at 4:46 of the third period, and he appeared to forge a tie with 5:43 remaining, but St. Louis successfully challenged that Point was offside prior to the goal.
--Field Level Media
