NASHVILLE — Down by three goals early in the second period, Nashville looked to its captain to turn the tide.
Mike Fisher scored twice and the Predators rallied to beat the St. Louis Blues 6-3 on Tuesday night.
“Yeah, it’s a great effort, being down like that and finding a way to come back and playing really good in the second and third period — against a great team, too, a division rival,” Fisher said. “That was a big win.”
James Neal, Filip Forsberg, Ryan Johansen and Mike Ribeiro also scored for Nashville, which snapped a two-game skid.
After trailing 3-0, the Predators scored six straight goals to earn their 10th home victory of the season.
“You’re not going to come back a lot of nights from 3-0. So the fact that we were able to, from the time James scored until the end of the game, play the style the way we needed to in order to be successful, was a positive,” Nashville coach Peter Laviolette said.
Kevin Shattenkirk, Ryan Reaves and Brad Hunt scored for St. Louis, which lost three of four on its road trip.
“It’s always tough being at the end of a road trip, but we’ve been a good road team here over the last few years,” Blues defenceman Alex Pietrangelo said. “You can’t use that as an excuse.”
With the game tied at 3, Colin Wilson carried the puck down the left side. Wilson waited as Blues defenceman Joel Edmundson slid along the ice in an attempt to take away his passing lane. Wilson slid a pass around Edmundson’s skate and found Fisher in the low slot, where the Predators’ captain beat goalie Jake Allen with a one-timer at 9:02 of the third.
“I saw him go onto his stomach and I just brought it around,” Wilson said. “Fish put himself into a good area where I could actually get it to him, so it was a good job by him.”
Wilson and Viktor Arvidsson each had two assists.
Shattenkirk scored the first goal at 10:12 of the opening period. From the right point, his wrist shot deflected off Predators defenceman Roman Josi and by goalie Pekka Rinne, who finished with 23 saves.
Reaves made it 2-0 at 16:41 of the first.
From below the goal line, Kyle Broadziak made a spinning backhand pass to Reaves in the left faceoff circle. Reaves skated toward the slot and beat Rinne with a wrist shot high to the glove side.
Hunt’s first of the season made it 3-0 at 1:49 of the second.
The Predators cut St. Louis’ lead to 3-2 with goals 2:15 apart in the second.
Neal scored his team-leading 12th of the season at 4:07 with a wrist shot from the slot after a faceoff win by Johansen in the offensive zone.
Forsberg followed at 6:22 with a long-range wrist shot that beat Allen between the pads. The goal was just the third for Forsberg, who equaled a franchise high with 33 last season.
“We had a 3-2 lead going into the third period,” Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said. “It’s been three games like this that we lost on the road where we’ve had the game taken from us in the third period.”
Nashville won for the first time this season when trailing entering the third.
Johansen tied it at 3:04 of the third with a wrist shot from the left faceoff dot that beat Allen to the far side.
Ribeiro ended Allen’s night when he scored at 10:31. Ex-Predator Carter Hutton replaced Allen and finished the game in goal for the Blues.
Fisher added an empty-net goal with 1:22 remaining.
NOTES: Blues LW David Perron played in his 600th NHL game. … Nashville C Colton Sissons and D Ryan Ellis returned to the lineup. Sissons missed seven games and Ellis was sidelined for eight, both with upper-body injuries. … Predators RW Craig Smith got his 100th career assist.
UP NEXT
Blues: Return home Thursday to play New Jersey.
Predators: Face the Minnesota Wild at home on Thursday.
