CALGARY, Alberta — After the wildness of their comeback win on Thursday, the Blues took a more boring approach on Friday and got the same result.
Buoyed by a penalty kill that stopped three penalties in the second period, including 22 seconds of two-man advantage, the Blues ran their win streak to three games, their point streak to four and snapped their overtime streak at three as they exploded for three goals in the first 10 minutes of the third period to break open a workmanlike 5-2 win over the Flames at the Saddledome.
Ivan Barbashev, Jordan Kyrou, Pavel Buchnevich, Brandon Saad and Robert Thomas scored as the Blues got their five-game trip west trip off to a good start with two wins, and against two of the teams they are chasing in the Western Conference standings. They now have two days off before resuming play in Vancouver on Monday.
Thomas Greiss got the start in goal and did every bit as well as Jordan Binnington had done on Thursday. He faced a lot of shots as the Blues seemed content to let Calgary shoot from the outside but not allow much in the middle. Greiss still had to be sharp with his glove and pads and the Blues limited Calgary’s rebound chances. Greiss faced 42 shots, which has been fairly typical of the workload he faces in his games.
The Blues spent a lot of time defending in the second period, when they were outshot 15-3 by Calgary. But one of those shots was a goal by Kyrou that put the Blues ahead. The Blues didn’t have a shot on goal in the final 11:46 of the second period and Buchnevich scored 3:46 into the third on their first shot on goal of that period to give the Blues a two-goal lead. They needed that when Connor Mackey got his second goal of the night with 12:20 to go in the third.
Just over a minute later, however, Mackey turned the puck over, putting it on Saad’s stick in his own end. Sixty-one seconds later, Thomas scored to pretty much put the game away.
