ST. LOUIS _ During his Saturday morning session with reporters, coach Craig Berube stressed the importance of coming out with a sense of urgency against the Nashville Predators.
The Blues didn't get the memo. En route to a 4-2 loss Saturday at Enterprise Center, they fell behind 3-1 lead after the first period and never could catch up.
The Predators scored 20 seconds into the contest. The visitors from Tennessee had 10 shots on goal before the Blues got their first. And by period's end, Nashville had a whopping 22 shots on goal.
To put that in perspective, the last time the Predators played here _ the infamous "Do I look nervous?" game by goalie Jordan Binnington _ Nashville had 19 shots the entire game.
Goal No. 1 came on a fortuitous long rebound to Filip Forsberg, for his 10th goal of the season. It was the quickest opponent goal against the Blues this season. Less than 3 { minutes later it became 2-0 Nashville after Mattias Ekholm's shot rebounded first off Jay Bouwmeester, then Justin Faulk, then off Binnington's stick and into the net.
The Blues killed off a 5-on-3, then made it a 2-1 game on Klim Kostin's first NHL goal.
But the Predators were operating at a different level than the Blues in the period, charging the net and getting to most of the loose pucks. With just 86 seconds left in the period. Mathieu Olivier skated in around Colton Parayko and sent a tight shot in on Binnington. Colton Sissons swooped in to tuck the puck under Binnington's pads for a 3-1 Nashville lead.
The Blues woke up to a degree in the second period, generating some quality chances particularly early in the period. After the lopsided shot total in the opening period _ 22-9 in favor of Nashville _ the Blues had a 10-9 edge in the second period.
But they couldn't solve backup Nashville goalie Juuse Saros, and entered the third period trailing 3-1.
In the third period a power-play goal by Alex Pietrangelo _ also with Binnington pulled for an extra attacker _ made things interesting late. Pietrangelo's seventh goal of the season was the 100th of his career, and it came with 3:08 to play.
But an empty-net goal by Calle Jarnkrok with 30.5 seconds left made it 4-2 and snapped Nashville's six-game winless streak. The Predators are 10-9-3. The Blues fell to 14-5-5.
