The St. Louis Blues played the New York Rangers for their second game on their New York/New Jersey road trip. This is the first of a two-game season series between the Blues and Rangers and the first game for head coach Jim Montgomery with the Blues after they fired head coach Drew Bannister on Nov. 24. The team was looking to bounce back from a tough 3-1 loss against the New York Islanders on Nov. 23. Lucky for them, they snagged their first road trip win against the Rangers, with a final score of 5-2.
Game Recap
First Period
The first few minutes of the period were tight, and both teams were solid in front of the net. At about the 8:47 mark in the first period, Rangers forward Will Cuylle scored off a shot from Kappo Kakko that deflected off his skate and past Blues goaltender Joel Hofer. Rangers defenseman Zac Jones also received the secondary assist.
Related: Islanders Hold on to Defeat Blues 3-1
About three minutes later, Blues star forward Jordan Kyrou answered with a snapshot goal for his seventh of the season from a behind-the-net pass from the Blues’ captain, Brayden Schenn. The period ended in a 1-1 tie, and shots were 15-14 Blues.
Second Period
As the second period commenced, forward Zachary Bolduc gave the Blues their only lead of the game at 4:30 into the second as he crashed in front of the net on a rebound that was shot from forward Radek Faksa for the primary assist and Dylan Holloway for the secondary assist. Almost three minutes later, Cuylle scored his second goal with a snapshot on a beautiful one-time pass from Mika Zibanejad and Brett Berard for the secondary assist.
Cuylle’s second goal would be his ninth of the season and the last goal of the second period, leaving the score at 2-2. However, a bit of a scrum between Cuylle and Blues forward Jake Neighbours ended the period with a four-on-four situation as both players took a minor penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct, putting them in the box for two minutes. The shot total for the period was 16-8 in the Blues’ favor.
Third Period
With the third period starting fresh with a four-on-four power play, 1:10 into the period, Blues extended the lead to 3-2 as defenseman Scott Perunovich dished a nice breakout pass in the neutral zone for Schenn on a breakaway as he buried it past Igor Shesterkin with a snapshot for his second point of the night and fourth goal of the season. After the goal, the Rangers took another penalty as forward Matt Rempe roughed Neighbours and served a two-minute minor penalty. However, the Rangers successfully killed the penalty this time.
The Blues did not stop there. At 11:35, Bolduc got his second of the game with a pass from Dylan Holloway to Colton Parayko at the blue line as Parayko snapped a pass from the point to Bolduc, who finished it with a snapshot, giving him two goals this season. At about the 6:50 mark, Bolduc had a chance to get a hat trick on a breakaway but lost an edge, allowing Shesterkin to make a glove save.
With the three-minute mark approaching, the Rangers pulled their goalie to make it a six-on-five situation to try and tie the game. Still, former Ranger forward Pavel Buchnevich scored the empty-netter goal from a pass by Oskar Sundqvist and Ryan Suter for a 5-2 score. The victory gave Jim Montgomery his first win as Blues head coach. The total shot count for the game was 43-29 Blues. The first star of the match was Bolduc, the second star was Cuylle, and the third star was Schenn.
The next time these two teams will face off will be Dec. 15 in St. Louis. Now, the Blues will have to direct their focus on their last game of the three-game road trip against the New Jersey Devils on Wednesday (Nov. 27). The Rangers will also be in action that night when they travel to Carolina to take on the Hurricanes.
