ST. LOUIS (AP) — Cam Fowler, Brayden Schenn and Nathan Walker scored in a 2:13 span of the second period and the St. Louis Blues beat the Winnipeg Jets 5-2 on Friday night to force a Game 7 in the first-round series.
Philip Broberg had a goal and an assist, Alexey Toropchenko also scored and Jordan Binnington made 21 saves for St. Louis who will return to Winnipeg for the deciding game Sunday night.
Cole Perfetti and Nino Niderreiter scored for Winnipeg, and Connor Hellebuyck made 18 saves before being pulled after the second period for Eric Comrie who made four saves. Hellebuyck is 0-7 while allowed at least four goals in each of his last seven road playoff starts.
“Tonight was not about Connor,” Jets coach Scott Arniel said. “Tonight we imploded in front of him, and so now it’s a one game showdown.”
Perfetti scored his first goal of the playoffs on a power play 5:43 into the second period to tie the score 1-1.
Walker put St. Louis back ahead with his third of the series with 8:26 remaining in the period, and Schenn got his second of the postseason 53 seconds later to make it 3-1.
Fowler scored his second goal of the playoffs with 6:20 remaining in the second period to give St. Louis a three-goal lead. Fowler has a point in all six games of the series, and his 10 points are the most in a series for a defenseman in franchise history.
Toropchenko capped St. Louis' four-goal period with 3:03 left in the second.
“We just had to control the momentum there,” Walker said. “I think after they got that power play goal we were a little flat and then we came out, took the momentum back and just kind of ran with it.”
The home team has won each of the first six games of this series.
Broberg scored his first goal of the playoffs on the Blues’ first shot on goal of the game 6:05 into the first period to put St. Louis ahead 1-0.
“I thought it was a great play by Faulk to drive wide and that’s that speed we’re talking about and then we had people drive through and were able to go low to high and pound that puck,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said. "It was really important because I did not like the start of our first 8-10 minutes, then we started to come after that goal."
Arniel called a timeout immediately after the goal but elected not to challenge the play for goaltender interference as Pavel Buchnevich had been pushed into the crease by Dylan Samberg.
Morgan Barron appeared to score the tying goal 29 seconds into the second period. However, the goal was overturned after St. Louis challenged the play when the officials ruled that Mason Appleton had entered the Blues’ zone before Barron carried the puck in.
Jets forward Nikolaj Ehlers returned to the lineup after missing Winnipeg’s last two regular season games and first five games of the playoffs with a right foot injury.
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AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
David Solomon, The Associated Press
