EDMONTON — Alex Pietrangelo had a goal and two assists as the St. Louis Blues maintained their hold on first place in the Western Conference with a 5-2 victory over the second-place Edmonton Oilers on Wednesday.
Jaden Schwartz, Robert Thomas, Tyler Bozak and Ivan Barbashev also scored for the Blues (11-33-3), who are on a six-game winning streak.
Connor McDavid and Zack Kassian responded for the Oilers (10-5-2), who have lost two in a row.
Leon Draisaitl extended his point streak to seven games with a feed to McDavid, who tucked his eighth goal of the season through the legs of Blues goalie Jake Allen, to open the scoring on a power play 2:46 into the game.
St. Louis responded with a power-play goal of its own six minutes into the first when Schwartz tipped a Pietrangelo point shot past Oilers starter Mike Smith.
Pietrangelo’s long-range bomb got past Smith seven minutes into the second period on another power play. Ryan O’Reilly’s deft pass to Pietrangelo set up the goal and the 2-1 lead for the Blues.
St. Louis added to its lead with five minutes remaining in the middle period as Thomas beat Smith glove side for his third of the year.
Draisaitl picked up another assist with nine minutes left to play when he sent a long feed to Kassian, who picked the top corner.
Bozak’s short-handed empty-net goal went into the net on a lucky bounce before Barbashev added another short-handed empty-netter.
Notes: The Oilers wrap up a three-game homestand on Friday against the New Jersey Devils. The Blues wrap up a four-game trip in Calgary on Saturday… It was the first of three games between the two teams. They will meet on Dec. 18 in St. Louis and then wrap up the season series back at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Jan. 31… Despite their successes thus far this season, the Blues and the Oilers have been getting very few shots on net, coming into the game ranked 28th and 29th respectively in shots per game.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2019.
Shane Jones, The Canadian Press