Forsberg has 3 points, Predators top Blues to end 3-game skid

NASHVILLE -- Filip Forsberg had two goals and an assist, and Juuse Saros made 44 saves for the Nashville Predators in a 6-3 win against the St. Louis Blues at Bridgestone Arena on Thursday.

Forsberg has 43 goals this season, an NHL career high.

“We don’t want to put ourselves in that spot where we’ve got almost 40 shots against after two periods, [Saros] is playing his [bottom] off and the penalty kill was great,” Forsberg said. “But we did. Guys showed up and stepped up in key moments of the game. Obviously, the third period was good. It was really good. I think we took it to them a little bit there.”

Gustav Nyquist had three assists, and Roman Josi scored for the Predators (44-28-4), who had lost three in a row following a team-record 18-game point streak. Ryan O'Reilly had two assists.

Nashville leads the Los Angeles Kings by three points for the first wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference.

Brandon Saad, Jake Neighbours and Jordan Kyrou scored for the Blues (40-32-4), who had won eight of their past 11 games (8-2-1). Justin Faulk had two assists, and Jordan Binnington made 25 saves.

St. Louis remained five points behind Los Angeles for the second wild card from the West.

“I thought we were the better team for most of the night,” Blues forward Robert Thomas said. “Frustrating result, obviously. I think we did a lot of really good things and just couldn’t find a way to bury on our chances.”

Josi gave the Predators a 1-0 lead 31 seconds into the first period on a 2-on-1 rush with Nyquist, scoring off Binnington’s pad.

“We’re moving straight ahead,” Nashville coach Andrew Brunette said. “I don’t know if we loved [our game]. I think we have to be a little realistic when you look through a stretch of 20-plus games here where I don’t know if we’ve had a night like this in 20. I think for us, we have to regroup a little bit.”

Saad tied it 1-1 at 7:27 on a one-timer from the slot off a pass from Thomas after a turnover by O’Reilly.
Forsberg put Nashville back ahead 2-1 at 1:13 of the second period on the power play with a wrist shot that went in off Binnington’s stick.

Anthony Beauvillier extended it to 3-1 at 19:29 with a power-play goal off a pass in the crease from Nyquist.

“Just got to put those in the net,” Beauvillier said. “Those are nice. It was great. I thought obviously a great play there by [Luke Evangelista] and [Nyquist] in front of the net. I just had to tap it home.”

Michael McCarron extended it to 4-1 at 4:09 of the third period on a wrist shot. Kiefer Sherwood forced a turnover from Blues defenseman Torey Krug, and McCarron beat Binnington with a wrist shot.

Neighbours made it 4-2 at 6:21 on a partial breakaway off a pass from Faulk.

Kyrou cut it to 4-3 at 17:45 on the power play with a one-timer from the left circle.

“Yeah, [Saros is] one of the best goalies in the League,” Faulk said. “He's been that way for a while. It's a tough goalie to crack. It's tough. Some nights you've got to try and lock it down and know in order to win a game, you might have to be a low-scoring game because you know you're going against a good goalie and a team that tries to play pretty tight defensively, not open it up too much.

“He played well tonight. We had 45, almost 50 shots or something. We threw a lot at him, that's for sure.”

Forsberg scored an empty-net goal to make it 5-3 at 18:16, and Mark Jankowski also scored into an empty net with 37 seconds remaining for the 6-3 final.

NOTES: Forsberg recorded his ninth multi-goal game of 2023-24 to match Matt Duchene’s franchise record for most in a season (nine in 2021-22). … Josi reached the 20-goal mark for the second time in his NHL career (23 goals in 2021-22) and joined Shea Weber as the second defenseman in Predators history to have multiple 20-goal seasons.