ST. LOUIS — Fashion model Karlie Kloss, who once dated St. Louis Rams quarterback Sam Bradford, was in the stands — wearing a Blues jersey.
The Blues Brothers, at least two guys dressed up like the movie characters, danced — pretty well — to “Soul Man” during a commercial break at Enterprise Center.
There were all kinds of goals scored. But unfortunately for the home team, most of them were scored by the visitors from Canada.
In a meltdown of near-epic proportions, the Montreal Canadiens scored five unanswered goals to finish off the second period and on into the third to turn a 3-1 Blues lead into a 6-3 Montreal advantage.
Vladimir Tarasenko temporarily stopped the bleeding with a third period goal of his own, but that was it. A 7-4 setback for St. Louis marked the team’s fourth loss in a row. The team rediscovered its offense to a degree, but lost its defense for the second game in a row.
The Blues have allowed a baker’s dozen of goals against Nashville and Montreal — that’s 13. The fact that two of them were empty-netters is of little consolation. At 3-4-0 now, the Blues next play the Los Angeles Kings on Halloween Night. Montreal improved to 5-4-0.
Sending the puck to the middle of the ice in your own zone generally isn’t a good thing. Such was the case late in the first period when veteran defenseman Nick Leddy had other options but decided to send the puck to the middle from down low.
It was intercepted by the Canadiens. Defenseman Jordan Harris sent a slapper from just inside the blue line that was deflected in the slot by Nick Suzuki past Jordan Binnington for a Montreal goal. So in a first period pretty much dominated by the Blues, it was a 1-1 game at the 4:52 mark of the first period.
The Blues outshot Montreal 10-6 in the period and had some excellent chances but had nothing to show for it.
Well, they did have a Jordan Kyrou goal to show for it, his second of the season and first since Game 2 of the season in Seattle. Originally the goal was credited to Brayden Schenn.
At the 7:47 mark of the first period Saturday, Schenn sent a wrist shot from the left circle toward former teammate Jake Allen, who was in goal for Montreal. Kyrou was net front, providing an effective screen and the goal trickled in past Allen. Apparently, Kyrou got a piece of the puck on its way in.
Montreal’s Brendan Gallagher and the Blues’ Tyler Pitlick had glorious scoring chances in the first period — both at the net front with the opposing goalie out of position. But Gallagher missed his tip-in attempt just 1 1/2 minutes into the game; Pitlick did so shortly before the Schenn goal with at least half the net open to his right.
Goals by Noel Acciari and Kyrou’s second goal of the night gave the Blues a 3-1 lead midway through the second period. They were seemingly in control and about to take the game by the throat. But no, Montreal scored the game’s next three goals — over a mere 4:50 — to take a 4-3 lead after two periods.
The last two of those three Montreal goals came on the power play, with first Ivan Barbashev (hooking) and then Colton Parayko (tripping) in the penalty box. So after killing off 12 consecutive penalties — a franchise record to open a season — the Blues allowed three goals over their next four PKs.
Cole Caufield, 21, scored two of the three goals to spark the Montreal comeback, the second of which snapped a 3-3 tie on a backdoor power play goal. The first Caufield goal involved some puck luck, with the puck caroming off the end boards to him in front for a layup.
As for the Blues’ goals, the Acciari goal — at 5:10 of the second period — was the first point scored by a member of the fourth line this season. It came on a net front rebound of a Pitlick shot; Pitlick was very active Saturday in just his third game as a member of the Blues.
Kyrou’s third goal of the season came 4 1/2 minutes later, on the power play, to give St. Louis a short-lived 3-1 lead.
