ST. LOUIS — In an Avalanche game that featured too much chasing and last-resort chips out of the defensive zone in the second period Monday night, the lone highlight came from Paul Stastny, a former Av. He inadvertently scored Colorado’s goal, the only play that kept the Avs in a game that unraveled in the middle period while completing an exhausting, five-game road trip.
Behind former Colorado College standout Jaden Schwartz (goal, assist), St. Louis beat Colorado 3-1 at the Scottrade Center in the Blues’ final game before what for them is a 10-day All-Star Weekend break. Stastny, a former University of Denver standout, had an assist and T.J. Oshie scored to make it 3-1 in St. Louis’ dominating second period.
“We don’t want to make excuses. We played a bad second period,” Avs defenseman Tyson Barrie said. ” That’s all that was, and it wasn’t acceptable. We talked about it between the second and third and knew we had a lot more to give. It’s unfortunate to kind of give them the game in the second period.”
The Avs, who host the Boston Bruins on Wednesday night before entering the break, regrouped for a strong third period but couldn’t put enough sustained pressure on Blues goalie Brian Elliott. Elliott entered the game with the NHL’s best goals-against average (1.90).
Colorado failed to score more than two goals in four-of-five game on its trip, finishing 1-2-2 (four points).
“It was the last game of our road trip. Five games. Always tough to win the last one,” Avs coach Patrick Roy said. “I’ll give them credit. They played a good game.”
The Avs began to unravel late in the first period when captain Gabe Landeskog slashed the stick out of Schwartz’s hands to send the Blues on their first power play. The penalty came with 32 seconds left in the period, and Schwartz capitalized 32 seconds into the second, cashing in on his own rebound.
“I had my stick in one hand, and I gave him a whack with one hand,” Landeskog said of his penalty. “He had his stick in one hand and … I don’t know if he lost it or what. Did I slash him that hard? He lost his stick, and it probably looked like, to the referee, that it was hard slash.”
St. Louis went on to outshot the Avs 14-5 in the period, and a dominating shift by the David Backes line led to Oshie’s rebound tap-in goal at 10:40.
“We allowed them to come hard at us, to forecheck us hard and play the way they want to play, and run around in our end,” Landeskog said. “Looking back at that second period, I felt like we were putting each other in the soup a little bit, giving the problem to somebody else instead of taking a hit to make the play.
“I do think the neutral-zone game wasn’t great tonight. We were losing a lot of pucks there, and then it comes right back at you.”
The teams traded first-period goals. Blues defenseman Carl Gunnarsson beat goalie Semyon Varlamov at 8:06 with a long shot through traffic, and Matt Duchene tied it at 13:02. Duchene was looking to backhand the puck to linemate Alex Tanguay on a back-door bid but Stastny put his stick in the passing lane and directed it into the net.
Mike Chambers: mchambers@denverpost.com or
