Blues HC Jim Montgomery pinpoints ‘awesome’ penalty kill as catalyst for Panthers win

It took some late-game drama, but the St. Louis Blues ended their five-game slide Thursday, handing the Florida Panthers a 5–4 defeat at Enterprise Center.

The game was a back-and-forth affair from the outset. Florida opened the scoring at 3:12 of the first period when AJ Greer pounced on a defensive miscue to net a rebound. St. Louis responded swiftly as Jake Neighbours, returning from a lower-body injury and questionable to play, converted a breakaway 1:34 later to tie the game 1-1. Jordan Kyrou, also back from injury, gave the Blues a 2-1 lead at 7:51 after a Philip Broberg interception and trail pass set him up in the left circle.

The Panthers tied the contest at 2-2 with a power-play goal from Sam Reinhart at 9:22, and Matthew Tkachuk, in just his sixth game after missing the first 47 of the season due to adductor and sports hernia surgery, scored twice to even the game at 4-4. Tkachuk scored at 16:52 and again on the power play at 18:39, giving him his first two goals of the season, and he also achieved the milestone of 400 career assists in the game.

At 11:01 of the third period, Nick Bjugstad was assessed a double-minor for high-sticking Evan Rodrigues, who was playing in his 600th NHL game. St. Louis killed the full four minutes without allowing a single shot, an astonishing feat given the team’s league-low 29th-ranked penalty kill.

Head coach Jim Montgomery credited the effort on the penalty kill as the turning point, saying:

“We had already given up two power-play goals. The effort by our penalty killers was awesome. The response by our fans was awesome, and it gave us life.”

Overall, the Blues went 5-for-7 on the penalty kill in a game that featured 18 penalties and 44 minutes of power play time.

The late-game heroics came on a power play. With just 9 seconds remaining, Pavel Buchnevich threaded a cross-ice pass to Jimmy Snuggerud in the left face-off circle, and Snuggerud rifled a one-timer past Panthers goalie Daniil Tarasov for the game-winning goal. Kyrou contributed a goal and two assists, while Buchnevich and Justin Faulk each recorded two assists. Joel Hofer made 17 saves for St. Louis, while Tarasov stopped 26 for Florida.

Other contributors included Jonatan Berggren and Oskar Sundqvist, who scored the Blues’ third and fourth goals, respectively, both returning from injuries. St Louis, now 20-25-9, will hope to carry this momentum into Saturday’s home matchup against the Columbus Blue Jackets.

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