Blackwood makes 35 saves, Sharks shut out Blues

ST. LOUIS -- Mackenzie Blackwood made 35 saves for the San Jose Sharks, who ended a nine-game losing streak with a 4-0 win against the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center on Saturday.

"Obviously the guys, they're battling hard and pushing, pushing and skating right to the end," Blackwood said of his 10th NHL shutout, second this season. "And last night or the other day (3-1 loss to the Minnesota Wild on Thursday) didn't really go our way. We played hard in the last two periods, but we didn't get the bounces and tonight we did. So it's nice to get rewarded for that."

Filip Zadina, Mikael Granlund and Luke Kunin scored second-period goals for the Sharks (17-48-8), who were 0-8-1 during the skid and had one win in their past 19 games (1-15-3).

"It was really a carbon copy of what happened in [Minnesota]," San Jose coach David Quinn said. "I thought we really were on our heels in the first period. 'Blacky' stood tall, gave us a chance and I really thought we got our wits about us and a much better second period and then obviously we're opportunistic as well with our chances. And the third period starts and you're going to get a push up 3-0. It's human nature to have that pushback from the team that's down and I thought as the period went on, we get better, we managed the situation better."

Joel Hofer made 16 saves for the Blues (39-31-4), who were 7-1-1 in their past nine games. St. Louis is five points behind the Los Angeles Kings for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference, having played one more game.

"It can't (happen) this time of year with the position we're in, with our team and where we are and how hard we fought to get to this position to let one slip against a team like that," Blues captain Brayden Schenn said.

Zadina made it 1-0 at 8:30 of the second when Zack Bolduc turned the puck over in the corner, and Zadina scored with a wrist shot high on the short side.

Granlund made it 2-0 at 12:05 when he knocked in a loose puck from the slot before falling on the ice.

Kunin made it 3-0 at 17:58 after the puck caromed off the corner boards to the right circle, and he beat Hofer with a wrist shot.

"You go into the second period, and we fell asleep," St. Louis coach Drew Bannister said. "We weren't doing the same things that we were in the first, whether it was us getting frustrated early on in the game where we weren't having a lot of success but we were doing things the right way. We just had to stick with it. Then we find ourselves in a hole. We turn the puck over. We get beat on a track and then we get a bad bounce, but we weren't working for those opportunities on our end, especially in the second period and then we're chasing the game from then. We have a team that's just defending in the third period. Now we have some chances, but we put ourselves in a deep hole there to climb out of."

Jan Rutta scored an empty-net goal at 16:47 of the third period for the 4-0 final.

"It's a good feeling to win a hockey game," Granlund said. "Obviously, we haven't been able to have that feeling too much this season, so we'll take every win there is."

NOTES: San Jose was outscored 44-20 in their winless skid. ... Granlund has five points (two goals, three assists) in a four-game point streak. ... William Eklund has five points (two goals, three assists) the past five games. ... St. Louis is the only team to lose to the Sharks twice this season. The Blues were 9-0-1 in their previous 10 games against San Jose before this season.