VANCOUVER — Brayden Schenn continues to make quite an impression on his new teammates.
The Blues centre scored at 2:41 of overtime on a great solo effort as St. Louis fought back from a 3-1 deficit to beat the Vancouver Canucks 4-3 on Saturday night.
Acquired from the Philadelphia Flyers in a trade at June's NHL draft, the red-hot Schenn now has five goals and 10 assists in what is now a career-high seven-game point streak.
"It's been fun," said Schenn. "The team is winning, we're playing good hockey.
"Guys are stepping up."
The 26-year-old picked gathered speed at his own blue line in the extra period and wheeled through the neutral zone before cutting into the slot and firing a rolling puck past Anders Nilsson's blocker for his eighth goal of the season.
"I just had fresh legs," said Schenn, who was acquired from Philadelphia for Jori Lehtera and a 2017 first-round pick. "I chucked a changeup on net … I'll definitely take the goals like that."
Schenn is tied with linemate Jaden Schwartz for the Blues lead with 26 points, and has fit in nicely since coming over from the Flyers.
"I'm just trying to be a piece of the puzzle," said Schenn.
Colton Parayko, Vladimir Sobotka and Joel Edmundson scored in regulation for St. Louis (15-5-1). Paul Stastny added three assists for the Western Conference-leading Blues, who got 20 stops from Jake Allen.
St. Louis, which sits second in the NHL's overall standings, a point back of the Tampa Bay Lightning, added to their league-leading goal production from defenceman with their 20th and 21st of the season from Parayko and Edmundson.
Sven Baertschi, with a goal and an assist, Brock Boeser and Markus Granlund replied for Vancouver (9-8-3), while Loui Eriksson added two assists. Nilsson made 27 saves for the Canucks, who have lost four of five and now head out on a six-game road trip.
"When we're up like that we've just got to keep sticking the fork in them," said Boeser. "We might have had a couple letdowns there where they scored. That's part of hockey — they score, we score.
"Unfortunately we were on the wrong side of things."
Trailing 3-2 after two periods, the Blues tied the game at 4:46 of the third when Edmundson fired a shot past Nilsson off a feed from Stastny after some good work by Alex Pietrangelo to force a turnover by Canucks defenceman Derek Pouliot in the corner.
The goal came moments after Nilsson made a nice pad stop on Sobotka's partial breakaway.
Nilsson, who started for the second time in three games after sitting out seven straight, then made another difficult save on Vladimir Tarasenko after he walked around Alexander Edler.
"That was a hard-fought game," said Canucks head coach Travis Green. "You've got to give them credit to come back from 3-1 on the road. Is there a couple things we would have liked to have done different? Sure."
Tied 1-1 through 20 minutes, St. Louis nearly grabbed its first lead at 3:45 of the second when Tarasenko snapped a shot from the face-off dot that snuck through Nilsson, but the Vancouver netminder reached back with his blocker hand and grabbed the puck.
Granlund then put the Canucks ahead 2-1 at 5:23 on a short-handed 2-on-1 rush where he outwaited Allen and emphatically buried his third through the five-hole.
Baertschi made it 3-1 on the power play at 10:58 when he swept Eriksson's rebound past Allen for his seventh, but Sobotka got the Blues back within one at 13:10 on a low shot.
Vancouver looked to have gone back ahead by two in the final minute of the period, but Thomas Vanek's goal was waved off after it was ruled a St. Louis player touched the puck with his hand on a delayed penalty to gain possession seconds before it entered the net.
Boeser, who leads the Canucks in scoring with seven goals and 10 assists despite playing just 17 of Vancouver's 20 games, got his team on the board at 11:44 of the first after winning consecutive puck battles down low against two Blues.
The 21-year-old rookie skated out of the corner and fired a shot that went through the legs of St. Louis defenceman Carl Gunnarsson and shortside on Allen, with Bo Horvat providing a screen in front.
St. Louis eventually tied the game with 1:26 left in the period when Parayko blasted a one-timer from a Stastny feed for his second.
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Joshua Clipperton, The Canadian Press
