St. Louis Blues keep finding ways to win edging Columbus Blue Jackets 2-1 -NHL Update
St. Louis is not one of those teams that have a fixed way of winning matchups but rather, focus on finding a unique way to take the win depending on the situation. Blues did exactly that against Columbus Blues Jackets on Sunday night, March 11, 2012, winning
2-1 at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus, Ohio.
Jaroslav Halak was the man that came up for an otherwise exhausted St. Louis team that was playing its second matchup in two nights, both against Columbus.
Coming out of a 4-1 win, it looked as if Columbus would be looking to make a comeback but by blocking 33 of 34 shots despite being overburdened, Halak made it look easy.
"We had no energy, the goalie found a way," St. Louis coach Ken Hitchcock said. "That's five games in nine nights with cross-country travel and we hit the wall. We hit the wall mentally. We hit the wall physically. Our goalie stole the game."
The defenseman were trying hard as well to keep the Blue Jackets out of their defensive end, but if Halak was not playing the way he was, it would have been hard for St. Louis to grab their fifth straight win.
"The way Jaro's playing games right now, he's capable of stealing games like that," Blues defenseman, Kevin Shattenkirk said. "There's no doubt about it that we did not play our best. He rose to the occasion and helped us out."
Patrik Berglund picked up the first of the night 1:09 into the second period for his 15th of the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season. It was levelled by Columbus’ Mark Letestu on the scramble in front of Halak nearly 10 minutes
later.
David Perron made the tie-breaker early in the third after which Halak shutdown the Blue Jackets team in the remaining time to take the win.
Widening their gap above second place Vancouver Canucks, St. Louis Blues are not looking to slow down anytime soon. They have the next against Chicago Blackhawks on Tuesday.
Blue Jackets on the other hand will be facing Edmonton Oilers on Wednesday to kick off a three-game Canadian road trip.
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