Sundqvist, Blues top Golden Knights, end three-game losing streak

ST. LOUIS -- Oskar Sundqvist had a goal and an assist in his return to the lineup, and the St. Louis Blues ended a three-game losing streak with a 4-2 win against the Vegas Golden Knights at Enterprise Center on Thursday.

Mackenzie MacEachern, Jaden Schwartz and Robert Thomas scored, and Jordan Binnington made 27 saves for St. Louis (19-8-6), which had lost three in a row in regulation for the first time since Nov. 17-21, 2018.
"Yeah, we never want to lose games, especially not three in a row," Sundqvist said. "Maybe our first period wasn't really good, but our second period, we really got to our game and that's how we need to play. When we do that, we're really hard to stop. We're creating a ton of chances. We just need to find that game we had in the second period and build off that one."
WATCH: [All Golden Knights vs. Blues highlights]
Max Pacioretty and William Carrier scored, and Marc-Andre Fleury made 25 saves for Vegas (16-13-5), which is 0-4-0 all-time in St. Louis.
"I thought we had two great periods, the first and the third, but the second wasn't obviously nearly good enough," Vegas coach Gerard Gallant said. "Lot of missed chances, but we were loose in the second. That cost [us] the hockey game.
"It was a good hockey game, two good hockey teams playing against each other, and when you give up three in the second like that … we turned the puck over, we gave them odd-man rushes and you're not going to beat a team like that."

The Blues scored three goals and outshot the Golden Knights 17-8 in the second period after falling behind 2-1.
Sundqvist, who missed six games with a lower-body injury, tied it 2-2 on a tip-in of Alex Pietrangelo's shot at 1:34.
"It feels like I'm in the right spots a lot of times," Sundqvist said. "At the same time, it's a really good job by the other guys to get the pucks there. Today, it was more a lucky goal. It was more a reaction when Petro shot it there. I'm happy it went in."
Schwartz put the Blues ahead 3-2 at 14:53 from the left circle, and Thomas scored 39 seconds later on a shot short side off Fleury's arm to make it 4-2.
"I thought we played very good in the first and the third, but I thought they came pretty hard [in the second period]," Fleury said. "They put the puck on net. Had a lot of bodies there and that fourth one, that's on me. I wish I would have stopped that one."
MacEachern gave the Blues a 1-0 lead at 4:52 of the first period on a shot from the slot after a pass from Jacob de la Rose, but Pacioretty tied it 1-1 25 seconds later when he followed in his own rebound.

Carrier gave Vegas a 2-1 lead at 12:28, scoring from in tight on a loose puck.

They said it

"I think you have to bring a 60-minute effort. You can't let yourself slip for even five or 10 minutes, whatever it was when they kind of poured it on there, so I think it's a competitive league top to bottom. You've got to be ready to go for the whole 60 minutes."-- Golden Knights defenseman Jon Merrill
"It's more direct, north hockey, that's what it is. And competitiveness. Just getting there, wanting the puck, competing, keeping the puck. But it's just going this way ... north. Go north. Let's go north. That's the way we play. We look fast that way. We play fast that way and that's the way we need to play the game." -- Blues coach Craig Berube on the second period

Need to know

Fleury tied Sean Burke for 14th all-time in the NHL in games played with 820. ... Merrill played because Nicolas Hague was sick. ... Sundqvist has 10 points (six goals, four assists) his past 10 games and seven points (four goals, three assists) in six games against the Golden Knights. ... St. Louis is 13-0-4 this season when scoring first. ... Binnington saved two breakaways by Vegas forward Alex Tuch, including one seven seconds into the third period.

What's next

Golden Knights:At the Dallas Stars on Friday (8 p.m. ET; ESPN+, TVAS, FS-SW, ATTSN-RM, NHL.TV)
Blues:Host the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; ESPN+, FS-MW, NBCSCH+, NHL.TV)