Blues' home struggles continue with 4-2 loss to Golden Knights

Jeff Gordon, St. Louis Post-Dispatch on Jan 23, 2025

Published in Hockey

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ST. LOUIS — At some point the Blues must establish some home-ice advantage to stay in the Western Conference playoff race.

They posted a disappointing 11-10-1 mark in their first 22 games at Enterprise Center. In Game 23 at home, the Blues fell 4-2 to the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday night.

The Blues gained a bit of traction by winning consecutive games over the Calgary Flames at home last week. But they slipped again during this mostly one-sided game to fall back to .500 on their rink.

Jordan Kyrou and Robert Thomas scored for the Blues and the team hit a couple of crossbars, but Vegas largely controlled the play while keeping goaltender Joel Hofer under fire.

The Blues expected pushback from the Golden Knights after edging them 5-4 in a shootout Monday in Las Vegas. That loss left the Golden Knights 1-5-1 in a span of seven games.

Vegas was highly motivated coming into this rematch. And it showed.

Vegas strikes immediately

The Golden Knights scored on their first shift of the game to take a quick 1-0 lead. Mark Stone, one of the NHL's top defensive forwards, stole the puck from defenseman Cam Fowler in the middle of the Blues zone with an aggressive forecheck.

Fowler couldn't recover as Stone broke in to beat Hofer 19 seconds into the game.

Vegas made it 2-0 at the 8:54 mark when Victor Olofsson moved in from the high slot to convert a backhand centering pass from Ivan Barbashev before Oskar Sundqvist could block his shot with a head-first dive.

The Blues got one goal back off the rush, with Dylan Holloway gaining the offensive zone, dropping the puck back to Kyrou, then driving the net occupy two defenders while Kyrou scored.

But Vegas stayed after the Blues, who were fortunate to escape the period with just a 2-1 deficit after getting outshot 14-4. Stone nearly made it 3-1 with 37.3 seconds left in the period, but his point-blank shot caromed off defenseman Justin Faulk and into Hofer's extended left pad.

Montgomery shuffles lines

The Blues rolled with the same lineup that earned two points from the Golden Knights on Monday. But it didn't take long for coach Jim Montgomery to move Pavel Buchnevich onto the Robert Thomas line and drop Brandon Saad down to the Sundqvist line.

Alas, this did not shift the momentum.

The Golden Knights increased their lead to 3-1 at the 6:30 mark of the second period. With Tyler Tucker off for high-sticking, Vegas immediately capitalized on the power play.

Stone fired a cross-crease pass to Pavel Dorofeyev for an open one-time blast from the right side.

Despite being outshot 24-8 after two periods, the Blues could have tied the game. Jake Neighbours hit the crossbar with a shot off the rush and Sundqvist hit the crossbar with a power-play redirection.

Hofer kept the Blues around with several big saves in the third period, including one on Jack Eichel walking in on a 2-on-1 rush. With Hofer off the ice for an extra attacker, Thomas whacked in the rebound of Buchnevich's slap shot to cut the deficit to 3-2 with 3:26 left.

But Tomas Hertl iced the for Vegas with an empty-net goal with 26.3 seconds left.