Carolina Hurricanes keep St. Louis Blues a bay with 2-0 shutout -NHL Update
St. Louis was just two points away from being the first team to reach the 100 point mark and secure a playoff spot but Carolina kept the Blues at bay as Carolina shut them out, 2-0, Thursday night, March 15, 2012, at the sold-out RBC Center in Raleigh, North
Carolina.
Cam Ward was outshot in the net compared to his St. Louis counterpart, Brian Elliott, 40-30, but remained focused and took it shot-by-shot, blocking all the Blues attempts for a perfect match and his 200th career win, all with Carolina Hurricanes.
"It means a lot to me," Ward said. "To win 200 games in this organization is something I'm proud of, but I don't want to stop now. ... We competed extremely hard. They've got a big, physical team and they've had a great season thus far."
After a scoreless 40 minute contest, Carolina came out strong in the final period to topple St. Louis.
Chad LaRose got his 15th goal of the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season with less than eight minutes remaining to play.
Jeff Skinner finalised the match with his 20th of the year early five minutes after LaRose, securing the contest in their favour in the final minutes.
St. Louis had a game plan going into the match, but it seemed as if a previous shootout loss to Chicago Blackhawks just affected them mentally too much to allow them to make a comeback against Carolina.
"We did a lot of good things," Blues coach, Ken Hitchcock, said. "(But) when the game was on the line in the third period we didn't manage the puck well and that was the difference in the hockey game."
One of the major reasons for St. Louis being unable to comeback in the final 20 minutes were their three straight penalties, which luckily, Carolina did not take advantage off.
Playing with a 4-on-5 man disadvantage for nearly five minutes of the last period did not allow Blues to get the goal.
Blues continue their road trip against Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday and are hopeful for the 100 point milestone.
Carolina can still make the playoffs if they try hard enough and are optimistic about continuing with some newly gained momentum as they face Minnesota Wild on the same day.
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