ST. LOUIS — One night after coach Doug Weight ripped his team for a lack of “heart,” the Islanders responded in a big way.
John Tavares scored early to start the Islanders’ three-goal first period, Thomas Greiss stopped 35 shots and they beat the Blues, 5-2, Saturday night.
“As players we know we’re the ones that go out on the ice and obviously have to do the job and execute,” Tavares said. “The system and the framework that they want us to play with, we weren’t really close to that last night so we just wanted to get out there and be a lot more competitive like we know we can be.”
Anders Lee had a goal and an assist, and Casey Cizikas, Jordan Eberle and Joshua Ho-Sang also scored to help the Islanders bounce back from a 5-0 loss at Dallas the previous night. Greiss won for the third time in his past four starts for the Islanders, which had just one win in its previous four games (1-2-1).
“Some heart would be nice to see,” Weight said Friday after the 5-0 drubbing in Dallas. “Some work ethic, maybe following a game plan and maybe some consistency as far as getting pucks in.”
One night after the Islanders mustered just 14 shots in the ugly loss to the Stars, Tavares got them on the scoreboard 3:21 into the game as he came from behind the net and beat Allen from point-blank range.
Cizikas got the rebound of a shot by Nick Leddy and easily beat Allen to double the lead just past the midpoint of the period.
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Eberle made it 3-0 as he took a pass from Jason Chimera on a 2-on-1 break and fired it past Allen on the glove side with 6:42 remaining for his sixth of the season and fourth in the past four games.
“We took advantage of some plays, but we got pucks in,” Weight said Saturday. “We were aggressive. We were skating.”
Brayden Schenn and Scottie Upshall scored for the Blues, and Jake Allen had 14 saves before he was pulled after Ho-Sang put the Islanders up 4-0 at 3:35 of the second period. Carter Hutton came on and stopped 10 of the 11 shots he faced.
The Blues, who snapped three-game winning streak and lost for just the second time in their last nine games, had allowed just six first-period goals all season.
Ho-Sang, called up from Bridgeport of the AHL earlier in the day to replace the injured Anthony Beauvillier, then chased Allen early in the second.
The Blues finally got on the board with 8 ¹/₂ left in the second a wrist shot from Schenn. Upshall scored off a scrum in front of Greiss at 6:41 of the third to pull St. Louis to 4-2.
Lee capped the scoring on a deflection with 4 ¹/₂ minutes to go.
Weight coached in St. Louis for the first time. Weight played parts of six seasons with the Blues. … The Islanders improved to 5-0-0 when scoring first this season.