DENVER — Pavel Buchnevich scored the go-ahead goal at 8:54 of the third period, and the St. Louis Blues won their ninth straight game, 2-1 against the Colorado Avalanche at Ball Arena on Saturday.
Buchnevich, who missed the previous four games with an illness, chipped the puck past the arm of Mackenzie Blackwood from atop the crease to give St. Louis a 2-1 lead after Ryan Suter’s point shot hit him in front.
“I know [Robert Thomas] make a play to ‘Sutes’, and I know Sutes going to shoot it,” Buchnevich said. “I just tried to get into in front of the net, and puck hit me. I got rebound, goalie doesn’t even see it.
“Actually, it’s like entertaining game, and to me, like interesting to play that game. Both teams played good hockey.”
STL@COL: Buchnevich sneaks it past Blackwood to give the Blues a 2-1 lead in the 3rd
Zack Bolduc also scored, and Thomas had two assists for the Blues (40-28-7), who are 11-1-1 in their past 13 games. Jordan Binnington made 28 saves.
St. Louis moved into a tie with the Minnesota Wild for the first wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference. Minnesota, which has a game in hand, lost 5-2 to the New Jersey Devils on Saturday.
“It’s the end of 10 (games) in 17 (days). We went 9-1; we lost the first one. It’s very impressive what we’re doing right now,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said. ““I thought the first period was a great period. I thought we had a lot of opportunities. Thought they did. It was offensive. Both teams tightened up in the second, and then in the third, I thought we executed really well.
“There’s something going on special right now, and it’s great to be a part of it.”
Nathan MacKinnon scored to extend his home point streak to 24 games for the Avalanche (45-26-3), who had won four straight, 12 of their past 14, and 11 in a row at home. Blackwood made 25 saves.
Colorado remained five points behind the Dallas Stars for second place in the Central Division. Dallas will have one game in hand following its game at the Seattle Kraken later Saturday.
“I didn’t love our first period, the checking side of it. I thought we were dangerous offensively,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. “And then after that, I liked our game. Like the penalties we took in the third period [are tough], obviously, when you’re trying to come back in a game and then we made a couple big mistakes.”
Bolduc gave St. Louis a 1-0 lead with a power-play goal at 10:57 of the first period. He one-timed Thomas’ crossing pass from just inside the right circle short side past Blackwood’s glove.
“It’s a great shot by him,” Thomas said. “It was a hard pass. He had to get it while it was landing and put it in a great spot. ‘Buchy’ sets it up nice. I’m just reading that guy on the far side — if he goes low to Buchy, it’s to the goalie [and] vice versa.
“The read is, if you have two guys over on that side, there’s only one guy [defending] and he can only cover one of them. So just looking at him.”
MacKinnon tied it 1-1 at 12:09 when he chipped a bouncing pass from Devon Toews over the leg and past the blocker of a sprawling Binnington.
MacKinnon has 41 points (16 goals, 25 assists) during his home streak, which is the longest in the NHL this season.
“We’re a team that generates momentum with how we play, and when we’re slow, we’re just giving it to other teams,” Toews said. “Tonight, when we were slow and when we were turning pucks over, we just gave them free momentum. Then you have to go and expend energy playing defense, and we want to play offense. And we have opportunities there, in the third, to score a couple and just couldn’t get the job done on that side.”
NOTES: MacKinnon recorded his seventh career 30-goal season and fourth in a row, joining Joe Sakic (nine), Michel Goulet (eight) and Peter Stastny (eight) as the only players in Avalanche/Quebec Nordiques history to score 30 goals seven different times. He also became the franchise’s fourth player to reach the 30-goal mark in four consecutive seasons along with Goulet (eight), Stastny (six) and Mikko Rantanen (four). … MacKinnon, whose 35-game home point streak in 2024-25 was the longest in franchise history, passed Joe Sakic for the second-longest home streak for the Avalanche/Nordiques at 24 games. … Thomas recorded his fourth consecutive multi-assist game, tying the longest streak in franchise history, last accomplished by Doug Weight (four games in 2002-03).
