{coyotes} Halak, Blues hang on to top slumping Coyotes

Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy - Helen Fielding

ST. LOUIS -- Since being named New Year's Day to the U.S. team for the 2014 Sochi Olympics, T.J. Oshie has stepped up his game.

Oshie scored twice for his second two-goal game since Jan. 2 in leading the St. Louis Blues to a 2-1 win against the slumping Phoenix Coyotes on Tuesday night at Scottrade Center.

U.S. teammate David Backes had a pair of assists, and Jaroslav Halak made 20 saves in a second consecutive strong outing to help the Blues (32-8-5) win for the seventh time in nine tries (7-1-1) against the Coyotes, who lost their fourth in a row and sixth in seven games.

The Blues are 8-1-0 in their past nine games and 10-1-1 in the past 12, outscoring opponents 48-19 in that stretch.

Oliver Ekman-Larsson scored the lone goal for the Coyotes. He also scored Monday in a 5-1 loss to the Winnipeg Jets. A night after seeing 38 shots, Mike Smith stopped 16 shots, but fell to 0-5-2 in his last nine appearances.

Oshie gave the Blues a 1-0 lead when he took an Alex Pietrangelo feed at the top of the right circle and ripped a one-timer past Smith 9:54 into the first period. It was Pietrangelo's ninth point (seven assists) during a six-game point streak.

Halak saw little action in the first, stopping four shots, but he made a nice blocker save on Ekman-Larsson with 4:42 left to preserve the Blues' slim lead.

The Blues' record held true to form when leading after the first period. They are now 19-0-2 when taking a lead into the first intermission. The Blues and Chicago Blackhawks (17-0-2) are the only teams in the NHL without a regulation loss when leading after one period. The Blues also improved to 27-1-3 when scoring first.

Oshie struck again to give the Blues a 2-0 lead when his shot from the blue line found its way through traffic and past Smith, who was screened on the play by Jaden Schwartz. The power-play goal came at 12:54 of the second period.

But the Coyotes would strike late in the period on the power play to get to within 2-1, when Ekman-Larsson's wrister from the right circle got past Halak with 47.9 seconds left. Defenseman Keith Yandle kept the play alive with a terrific stop of an attempted clear on the blue line in front of the Coyotes bench.

Ekman-Larsson's goal snapped the Blues' streak of successful penalty kills at 21.

Halak regrouped and had to be sharp right off the bat in the third period, making a point-blank stop on Lauri Korpikoski 14 seconds in. Halak outdid himself with 18:18 remaining in the game, taking a sure goal away from David Moss with a combination leg-stick stop sliding from left to right.

Radim Vrbata had another great chance for the Coyotes with 4:16 remaining in the game, but his wrister rang off the cross bar from the left slot.

Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding

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