Sitting at 27-24-6, the Panthers, who trail the Capitals by just two points for a wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference, will now prepare for a critical matchup at Washington on Thursday.
"The biggest game of the season, for sure," Panthers defenseman Radko Gudas said. "It comes down to these games, these conference games that mean a lot. I think everybody's going to look forward to that. A game with a lot of meaning is always fun to play."
On the wrong end of some back luck in the first period, the Panthers fell behind when Torey Krug's shot on the power play hit off Brayden Schenn, then off the end boards, and then finally off of the back of Spencer Knight's skate and into the net give the Blues a 1-0 lead at 11:27.
Doubling the lead for St. Louis just 35 seconds into the second period, Brayden Schenn kept the puck himself on a 2-on-1 rush before firing a shot into the net to make it 2-0. Later in the period, Nick Leddy, playing in his 900th NHL game, scored from the left circle to make it 3-0 at 12:51.
Exiting with an undisclosed injury in the middle frame, Sam Bennett did not return for Florida.
"We'll get a better look at it tomorrow," Maurice said.
Finding the back of the net for the second straight game, Eetu Luostarinen got the Panthers on the board when he took a pass from Matthew Tkachuk and beat Jordan Binnington from in front to make it 3-1 at 18:44.
"We had some momentum, and we had good chances," Gudas said. "We had good chances to come back. I believed in our group all the way until the end. I thought in the first period we had grade-A chances that if we buried the game could've went different."
But after a few big saves from Binnington to keep the Panthers from closing the gap, the Blues pulled away near the midway point of the third period when Ryan O'Reilly and Jordan Kyrou lit the lamp just 20 seconds apart at 9:28 and 9:48, respectively, to make it a 5-1 deficit for Florida.
Not going down without a fight, Carter Verhaeghe pushed back when he took a pass from Tkachuk and fired a laser past Binnington from the top of the right circle to make it 5-2 at 13:27. His 10th goal in the last 13 games, Verhaeghe leads the Panthers with a career-high 29 goals.
With 2:48 left in regulation, Ivan Barbashev cashed in on the empty net to make it 6-2.
"It's frustrating," Verhaeghe said. "We want to win every game, but we know it's not possible. We just want to keep building our game and try and get better every night. We're on the right track, but tonight wasn't our best. I think we're going to bring our best in Washington."
