Binnington gets 1st shutout of season, Blues defeat Canadiens

ST. LOUIS -- Jordan Binnington made 25 saves for the St. Louis Blues in his first shutout of the season, a 2-0 win against the Montreal Canadiens at Enterprise Center on Saturday.

The shutout came one year to the day since Binnington’s last; he made 20 saves in a 4-0 win against the Ottawa Senators on Jan. 3, 2025. Binnington was coming off allowing six goals on 43 shots in a 6-1 loss at the Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday.

“Yeah, definitely that feels better for sure,” Binnington said. “We played hard, good win at home, some good special teams, a good short-handed goal. Some guys had some big games. It’s obviously a better outcome.”

Jonatan Berggren and Robert Thomas scored for the Blues (17-18-8), who defeated the Vegas Golden Knights 4-3 here Friday.

Asked what stood out, St. Louis coach Jim Montgomery said, “How well ‘Binner’ battled for us and how well we battled for him in the crease. I thought that our urgency at clearing the crease, there was a lot of scrambles, but we managed the chaos really well, and I thought our puck support tonight was really good -- coming out of our D-zone, on entries into the offensive zone -- and I think it allowed us to have a lot of opportunities, especially in the first two periods.”

Jacob Fowler made 17 saves for the Canadiens (22-13-6), whose seven-game point streak ended (5-0-2).

“I thought execution was poor,” Montreal captain Nick Suzuki said. “I thought we kept building our game, just weren’t able to capitalize on offensive chances. It’s a big reason why we lost.”

Berggren made it 1-0 at 10:48 of the first period. After a turnover by the Canadiens in their own end, Cam Fowler skated down the slot and found Berggren in the right face-off circle for a one-timer.

“Otto [Stenberg], he kind of made a play on the wall there and I saw some open ice where I could maybe jump in,” Cam Fowler said. “By the time I got it, I was in a pretty good scoring area, but I saw ‘Bergy’ there. If I could just put him in a good position where I could maybe make the goalie pause a little bit and slide it over to him, and he made a great shot. I think it was just a good, overall play by everybody.”

Thomas scored short-handed for a 2-0 lead at 10:13 of the second period. He started the play by picking off a pass from Lane Hutson in the neutral zone, eventually backhanding a loose puck in the slot after it came off the stick of Blues forward Alexey Toropchenko.

“I saw the guy try and jump me there,” Thomas said. “I was able to just get around him and ‘Torp’ made a good play and [it] just kind of bounced to me. That’s about it.”

The Blues killed off a 5-on-3 advantage that lasted 1:37 for the Canadiens in the second.

“Execution wasn’t there as we have when we’re playing our best game,” Canadiens forward Juraj Slafkovsky said. “We should have scored on the power play, that’s for sure.”

St. Louis was 4-for-4 on the penalty kill.

“Good pre-scout,” Binnington said. “We knew some of their tendencies. You’ve got to just have fun with it and battle. That’s what we did. … They know where each other are on the ice and they like to slide pucks back door and through the crease and stuff like that. Obviously have some good one-timers on both sides.”

Binnington made several key saves, including one on Ivan Demidov’s shot on the power play from low in the right circle at 13:40 of the second, when he stretched out his left pad, and another on Zachary Bolduc at 19:56, when the former Blues forward was skating in on him.

“Maybe off the pad. Just desperation,” Binnington said the save on Demidov. “They’ve got some high-end talent on that team. You’re just trying to see if the guy’s a lefty or a righty.

“End of the period, sometimes the last minute guys think the clock’s going to run out and it happens both ways. They got a chance. Obviously it was a 2-0 game at the time, so you want to make that save and close out the period. [Bolduc] just got a partial breakaway and I stayed with him.”

Binnington then preserved the shutout by stopping Suzuki at the top of the crease with his right pad with 49 seconds remaining in the third period.

“He was great,” Cam Fowler said. “Gave us a chance to win that hockey game, made some huge saves for us in some crucial times and was a big reason why we were able to get the two points tonight. Him and [Joel Hofer], they always battle for us and give us a chance to win. Binner was outstanding.”

NOTES: Binnington got his 19th career shutout to move within one of tying Jaroslav Halak for third on the franchise’s all-time list. … Blues defenseman Colton Parayko played his 766th game, moving past Alexander Steen for fourth in St. Louis history. … Thomas has 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in a five-game point streak against Montreal and has 15 points (six goals, nine assists) in 10 games against the Canadiens. … Montreal forward Josh Anderson was scratched after leaving a 7-5 win against the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday with an upper-body injury.