CHICAGO – Pavel Buchnevich had a goal and two assists for the St. Louis Blues in a 4-2 victory against the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Sunday.
Jordan Binnington made 32 saves for the Blues (11-8-1), who have won three of their past four games. Jake Neighbours scored twice, and Torey Krug and Robert Thomas each had two assists. St. Louis had made goaltending changes during each of its previous two games.
“Full 60,” Binnington said. “Just the feel from the beginning to the end. It was a fun game. The rink was loud right from the national anthem, so it was fun, a fun Sunday afternoon.”
Arvid Soderblom made 24 saves for the Blackhawks (6-13-0), who won 4-3 in overtime against Toronto on Friday but have yet to post back-to-back victories this season.
“Disappointed,” said veteran forward Nick Foligno. “I didn’t like our start. We talked about this. It’s building winning habits and understanding what those are. I understand in the sports world, a lot of cliches get thrown around, like words, buzzwords. But there is a definition behind a lot of them. Commitment, that’s what we have to learn here. It’s just how to do it over and over again.
“Sometimes, it’s not fun or exciting, but it’s how you win in this league. We’re not over checks. We’re not reloading, and boom, boom, boom, they’re in the back of the net. We push back, get our game going. We get a goal, but then we just don’t sustain it. So, it’s a disappointing one because we really felt we were understanding of how we had success against Toronto, and we’re right back in the loss column.”
Neighbours put the Blues ahead 1-0 at 3:21 of the first period, shooting a backhand past Soderblom on a breakaway.
“It was just a good play by the fellas to get the puck out of the zone,” Neighbours said. “I just saw that it took a bounce where I had a chance to get to it. We [Neighbours and Chicago defenseman Kevin Korchinski] kind of went neck and neck there. I just tried to shield him with my body and make sure I was protecting the puck at all costs. I just had a lot of speed, so just tried to go side-to-side.”
Recap: Blues at Blackhawks 11.26.23
Kevin Hayes took a pass from Jordan Kyrou in the left face-off circle and scored on a wrist shot to make it 2-0 at 5:27.
Ryan Donato made it 2-1 at 14:45, tipping in Isaak Phillips’ wrist shot from the right point.
Buchnevich restored the Blues’ two-goal lead with a power-play goal at 17:02.
Neighbours scored off a pass by Buchnevich at 13:52 of the third period to make it 4-1.
“We want to play this way,” St. Louis coach Craig Berube said. “We don’t want to give up the goals we gave up. We won the game in Arizona (6-5 on Wednesday), but you can’t give up that many goals. Obviously, last game (an 8-3 loss against Nashville on Friday), we let it get away from us again. It was good. We tightened it up. I thought we did a good job on [Connor] Bedard (zero points, minus-1) tonight. He’s a good player, but I thought we kept him out and took time and space away from him tonight. I thought our ‘D’ really closed plays out early tonight.”
Boris Katchouk got his first goal of the season on a breakaway at 18:58 for the 4-2 final.
“It was a little frustrating, I think the way, we just weren’t alert or kind of aware tonight, and not a physical effort,” said Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson. “I thought obviously, we pushed back in the second again, and you’re always under duress when you’re behind and trying to catch up. But I don’t know why, I just think they were the hungrier team tonight and we let them be, so that’s frustrating to see because I thought we want[ed] to try and take that excitement from last game and put it into tonight, and we just didn’t do that.”
NOTES: The Blues are 10-0-0 this season when scoring first … Buchnevich collected his 13th three-point game and 45th multi-point game. He surpassed Robert Thomas (44) for the most multi-point games, and only Jordan Kyrou (12) and Vladimir Tarasenko (12) have more three-point games since Buchnevich joined the Blues in 2021-22. … Foligno played in his 1,100th game. He’s one of only 21 active players to do so.
