Jake Neighbours scored twice, Pavel Buchnevich had a goal and two assists and Jordan Binnington stopped 32 shots to lift the visiting St. Louis Blues to a 4-2 victory against the Chicago Blackhawks on Sunday.
St. Louis capitalized on an early flurry to win for the third time in four games, with each victory in that span coming on the road. Chicago has lost six of seven.
Torey Krug and Robert Thomas had two assists apiece for the Blues, while Wyatt Kaiser had two for Chicago.
Outshot 10-8 in the first period, the Blues made the most of their chances with a three-goal burst against Chicago goaltender Arvid Soderblom.
Neighbours and Kevin Hayes scored in a 2:06 span early in the first to propel the Blues. Neighbours opened the scoring just 3:21 into the game, outracing Chicago’s Kevin Korchinski to the puck before converting a breakaway to extend his points streak to five games.
Hayes struck on a wrist shot from the left wing, giving St. Louis a 2-0 lead until Ryan Donato’s goal put Chicago on the board at 14:45 of the first period. Donato tipped in a point shot from Isaak Phillips moments after St. Louis killed a minor penalty.
Given a man advantage of their own soon after, the Blues cashed in 2:17 after the Donato goal when Buchnevich corralled Thomas’ pass and beat Soderblom.
Chicago pushed the tempo for much of the middle period but was unable to solve Binnington, who was especially sharp during a sequence midway through the second. Moments after denying Reese Johnson’s rebound attempt, he followed suit on Alex Vlasic’s slap shot to keep the Blues’ advantage at two goals.
Another Blackhawks chance slipped away when Tyler Johnson missed on an open-net opportunity at 11:25 of the third.
Neighbours put St. Louis ahead 4-1 with 6:08 to play, scoring after Buchnevich forced a turnover in the corner. Boris Katchouk provided the final margin with a Chicago goal with 1:02 left. Donato and Kaiser notched assists.
Soderblom made 24 saves for the Blackhawks, who outshot the Blues 34-28.
St. Louis continued a successful extended run at United Center. The Blues have earned a point in 11 of their past 12 games in Chicago dating to 2017-18, going 8-1-3 in that span.
–Field Level Media
