BLUESDavid Perron is in pursuit of history as the St. Louis Blues head to Washington, DC to take on the Capitals. His six-game goal streak is one shy of the highest mark for a Blue in the past 25 years, an honor held by Mike Sillinger when he scored in seven straight games in the 2005-06 season.
The club's all-time record belongs to Brett Hull, scoring 16 goals during a ten-game streak in the 1990-91 season and 14 goals in another ten-game streak the following year.
Perron has made the most of this recent stretch, adding his seventh career hat trick - and second of the season - as his ninth, 10th and 11th goals over a nine-game span.
Unfortunately, Perron's hat trick was part of a bittersweet Saturday for the Blues, who fell 5-4 in Columbus. Another bright spot was Alexey Toropchenko, who scored his first career NHL goal in the second period.
"We scored four goals, that's enough goals to win a hockey game, for sure," said Blues Head Coach Craig Berube. "We gotta do a better job keeping (the puck) out of our net, and then penalties, too, a little bit. We gotta be more disciplined on penalties."
With the Blues' acquisition of defenseman Nick Leddy at the Trade Deadline, they'll look to shore up the blue line play as the Playoff race tightens over the next several weeks.
Leddy arrived in Washington, D.C. and will play Tuesday
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The Blues enter the game against Washington with a record of 34-18-9, good for 77 points and second in the Central Division as of Monday afternoon. After third-place Minnesota acquired goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury on Monday, the Blues will need to be at their best to stay in strong Playoff position.
The Blues return to St. Louis after their matchup with the Capitals for three straight games at Enterprise Center before taking a West coast road trip.
CAPITALSThe Washington Capitals are clicking right now, winning seven of their last nine games entering Tuesday's game with the Blues.
The stretch included two wins against the Metropolitan Division-leading Carolina Hurricanes, a team the Blues will host next weekend.
Washington is coming off of a 3-2 loss at home to the Dallas Stars in which Alex Ovechkin recorded his 40th goal of the season on a second-period power-play goal. The future Hall-of-Famer is now on his own four-game goal streak as he continues making history this season.
Ovechkin's power-play goal on Sunday was the 282nd of his career, building his lead as the NHL's all-time best power-play goal scorer.
This year, Ovechkin has passed Marcel Dionne, Brett Hull and Jaromir Jagr to move into third place on the all-time goals leaderboard. With 40 goals this season, his 770 career total is just 31 shy of Gordie Howe for second, and 124 shy of Wayne Gretzky's record.
Former Blue T.J. Oshie has not played in the last two games as he deals with a lower-body injury.
The Capitals acquired forward Marcus Johansson for his second stint with the team as they make their Playoff push, with a record of 35-19-10 and a firm grip on the second Wild Card spot in the Eastern Conference.
HEAD-TO-HEADThe Blues got the better of the Caps when they visited Enterprise Center earlier this year, winning 5-1 on Jan. 7. The Blues are 6-4-2 in the last 12 matchups between the teams but have not visited Washington since Jan. 14, 2019 - nine days before the 11-game win streak that sparked the Blues' Stanley Cup run.
