Brad Marchand, David Pastrnak lift Bruins past Blues

ST. LOUIS -- The night belonged to Boston Bruins right wing David Backes, but it was his teammates who made it a triumphant return to the place Backes called home for 10 seasons.
Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak each had three points when the Bruins defeated the St. Louis Blues 5-3 at Scottrade Center on Tuesday.

WATCH: All Bruins vs. Blues highlights
Marchand had two goals and an assist, and Pastrnak had three assists for Boston, which led 3-0 after the first period on goals from Frank Vatrano, Brandon Carlo and Marchand.
Backes played here for the first time since signing with Boston as a free agent July 1. Backes, who played 727 regular-season games with St. Louis, didn't have a point but had 17 penalty minutes.
"It's special, but certainly something I've never experienced before and it was great to be back in the building and thankfully we jumped out to a decent lead because trying to bottle up everything on the ice was tough, no question about it," Backes said, "And the guys played amazing and they were able to get two points out of the game. I had the best seat in the house for most of the third period but that's part of the game."

Vatrano and Torey Krug each had a goal and assist for the Bruins (22-17-5), who got 14 saves from Tuukka Rask and improved to 2-0-1 on their four-game road trip.
"I thought we had a really good game all the way through especially with a few guys going down, [Backes] being in the box for 17 minutes," Marchand said. "I thought the guys responded really well and we had a really good game. That's what we need to continue to play well."
Colton Parayko, Patrik Berglund and Kyle Brodziak scored for St. Louis (21-15-5), which finished a season-high six-game homestand 3-3-0. Jake Allen allowed three goals on 11 shots and was replaced at the start of the second period by Carter Hutton, who made 26 saves.
The Blues have alternated wins and losses the past nine games and are 6-8-1 in the past 15 games.
"It's frustrating," St. Louis defenseman Alex Pietrangelo said. "We're tired of talking about it, we're tired of answering the questions from outside our locker room. We need to be better, especially early on. I thought at points in the second and third, we showed spurts of what we had to do, but we've got to find a way to do it right from the start."
Vatrano gave the Bruins a 1-0 lead at 8:19 of the first period with a power-play goal after a failed clearing attempt by Brodziak.

Carlo scored after his shot ricocheted off the back boards and then off the side of the net before Allen kicked it into his own net for a 2-0 Bruins lead at 15:20. Marchand beat Allen with a shot from the right faceoff circle to the short side at 17:52 to make it 3-0.
"This is really tough for me right now," said Allen, who's been pulled in three of his past five starts. "The crazy thing is, I don't feel bad on the ice. I feel like I'm practicing well, I feel good out there. It's just pucks are getting behind me, and I've got to find a way to stop that sooner than later."
Krug scored Boston's second power-play goal in as many chances to make it 4-0 at 1:31 of the second.
Parayko's first of the season, a power-play goal at 3:57 of the second, made it 4-1.
Berglund's power-play goal with 9:46 to play cut Boston's lead to 4-2. Marchand scored into an empty net with 1:17 remaining for a 5-2 Bruins lead, and Brodziak scored with 25 seconds remaining to make it 5-3.

Goal of the game

Instead of allowing the Blues to build momentum, Krug built on the three-goal lead the Bruins built in the first period when he scored on a shot from the high slot that beat Hutton to the glove side off the inside of the crossbar.

Save of the game

Hutton stopped Ryan Spooner with 6:18 remaining in the game with a sprawling right-pad save after Spooner made a nice curl through the crease.

Highlight of the game

Marchand's goal came from a shot on the short side that beat Allen.

Unsung performance of the game

Bruins center Patrice Bergeron, who had two assists, played 20:56, led the Bruins with eight shots on goal, and won 15 of 29 faceoffs.

They said it

"There is no doubt they wanted to win it for [David Backes], but that's kind of overshadowing the effort we made." -- Bruins coach Claude Julien

Need to know

Bruins defensemen Adam McQuaid (upper body) and Colin Miller (lower body) were injured and did not return. ... Marchand extended his point streak to four games (five goals, two assists). ... Blues right wing Vladimir Tarasenko played in his 300th game.

What's next

Bruins: At the Nashville Predators on Thursday (8 p.m. ET; TVA Sports, SNO, FS-TN, NESN, NHL.TV).
Blues: At the Los Angeles Kings on Thursday (10:30 p.m. ET; SN, SN360, FS-W, FS-MW, NHL.TV)