CALGARY, Alberta (AP) — For David Perron, Calgary has become his home away from home.
Up against a team he’s always thrived against and in a building he enjoys playing in, Perron had a goal and an assist in regulation and added a shootout goal to help the St. Louis Blues beat the Calgary Flames 5-4 on Tuesday night.
Perron has 17 goals in 39 career games against the Flames, includings 12 goals in 20 games at the Scotiabank Saddledome.
“I like the old barn, maybe. I don’t know,” said Perron, when asked about his success historically against Calgary. “I always have fun coming up to Canada and playing here, even when I was back with the Oilers.”
Alex Steen, Jaden Schwartz and Zach Sanford also scored in regulation for the Blues, who got their first win the tiebreaker in four games this season. Jordan Binnington stopped 27 shots to improve to 23-8-5.
Sean Monahan scored twice, and Matthew Tkachuk and Mark Jankowski also had goals for the Flames, who were 5-0 in shootouts. Cam Talbot finished with 30 saves.
The Flames were 3 for 3 on the power play during regulation, and got a fourth man-advantage in overtime, but squandered it.
“It’s obviously a big kill,” said Blues captain Alex Pietrangelo. “Four-on-three’s are never easy, especially late in the game when you’re tired, legs and brain are a little tired. Good time for us to step up and kill that.”
Perron and Ryan O’Reilly scored on St. Louis’ first two shootout attempts, while Monahan and Tkachuk missed their tries.
In a wild back-and-forth game in which both teams blew two leads, St. Louis tied it 4-4 less than a minute into the third period.
After Andrew Mangiapane hit the goal post at one end, the Blues raced up ice on a 2-on-1 with Sanford keeping the puck and ripping a shot over Talbot’s glove.
St. Louis then scored what appeared to be the go-ahead goal less than three minutes later when Talbot muffed Perron’s shot off the wing. However, interim head coach Geoff Ward challenged the play for offside and after video review, the goal was waved off.
“I kind of had a feeling right away,” said Perron, who extended his point streak to four games (2-4-6). “Even going through the line I was asking, ‘is it offside?’ Coming back to the bench I saw coach right away. If it’s a quick challenge like that, it doesn’t go our way very often.”
St. Louis lost 3-1 in Vancouver on Monday night in its first game back after an eight-day layoff. It was the Flames’ first game in 10 days.
“It’s tough to come off (the break) and have two back-to-back games against teams that play heavy and have speed,” O’Reilly said. “It is good though. We got two points tonight. Last night they were available and we didn’t get them. We have to keep building and keep growing our game and get back on track here.”
After taking a 3-2 lead after 20 minutes, thanks to two goals in the final couple minutes of the first period, the Blues’ second lead of the night was erased at 4:40 of the second when Monahan scored off a pass from Johnny Gaudreau, for Calgary’s third power-play goal.
Five minutes later, the Flames surged back in front when Jankowski converted a centering feed from Sam Bennett. It was the second goal in two games for Jankowski after he started the season without a goal in the first 38 games.
Calgary had a chance to go up by two, but on his second breakaway of the period, Gaudreau was thwarted once again by Binnington. After a deke to his backhand didn’t work on his first try, he tried to shoot high blocker side, but again was denied by the Blues’ goalie, who also got a pad on the rebound.
“He’s a good goaltender,” Gaudreau said. “You watch him in the playoffs last year, he’s a hard goalie to score against. The first breakaway, I didn’t sell it enough. Second one, I just missed low, he got a quick blocker on it.”
St. Louis opened the scoring at 5:45 of the first. Oliver Kylington gave the puck away to Steen, who worked a width-of-the-ice give-and-go with Robert Thomas, with Steen finishing for his fifth goal of the season.
After power-play goals five minutes apart by Tkachuk and Monahan put Calgary in front, Perron tied it with 1:19 left. Schwartz’s deflection 8 seconds into a man-advantage made it 3-2 just 44 seconds later.
NOTES: Steen’s goal was his 494th career point, moving him ahead of Pavol Demitra and into fifth place on the Blues’ career list. Steen later left the game with a lower-body injury. … Schwartz played in his 500th game. … Flames RW Buddy Robinson, 28, just up from Stockton (AHL), played his eighth career game and first since Dec. 10, 2016, when he was with Ottawa. … Monahan recorded his 400th NHL point.
