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Winchester's heroics lift Blues past Sharks

Dec 28, 2008 - 5:12 AM ST. LOUIS (Ticker) -- Brad Winchester tied the game in the third period and scored the decisive goal in the shootout to lift the St. Louis Blues to a 3-2 victory over the San Jose Sharks on Saturday.

David Perron also tallied in regulation before scoring in the opening round of the bonus format and Manny Legace made 24 saves for the Blues, who had lost seven of their previous eight contests.

"It was the best defensive game we played all year," Legace said. "The boys showed up and played extremely hard tonight."

Mike Grier and Jonathan Cheechoo each scored a goal and set up another for the Sharks, who failed to win their third straight game.

"We didn't really play our game at all," Grier said. "We played our game in spurts and it wasn't good enough. They worked hard and probably earned the two points tonight. We weren't getting our forecheck going enough and then, when we had chances to shoot. We were trying to make plays instead of throwing the puck on the net."

"They came out better prepared than us," Cheechoo said. "We didn't respond like we should have. It's frustrating. We have to be ready next game."

After Ryane Clowe evened the shootout in the second round, Winchester fired a wrist shot past San Jose goaltender Evgeni Nabokov on the stick side. Legace then denied Joe Pavelski to secure the win for St. Louis.

"Our team played well tonight," Winchester said. "Certainly the energy in the building helped us a lot. It's a big win. Hopefully, we can take this momentum into tomorrow (vs. Anaheim). We played hard, we played smart and we pressured at the right times. It paid dividends in the end."

With the Blues facing a 2-1 deficit, Winchester evened the contest exactly six minutes into the third session with his fifth goal of the season.

St. Louis, which had suffered a pair of 5-4 losses to the Sharks already this season, opened the scoring 26 seconds into the game when Perron beat Nabokov between the pads with a wrist shot.

"I thought we played solid," Blues coach Andy Murray said. "If you want to have a chance to beat a team like San Jose, you have to have the puck. I thought we had the puck against them tonight. We had a pretty good time of possession tonight."

Despite managing a season-low 10 shots through the first two periods, San Jose entered the third with a 2-1 lead after Cheechoo and Grier both netted their fifth goals of the campaign 5 1/2 minutes apart in the second.

Nabokov turned aside 26 shots and Joe Thornton had two assists for the Sharks, who have lost three of their last five contests.

"We weren't prepared to play," Sharks coach Todd McLellan said. "And to be quite honest with you, you could almost see it coming. Our input into practice yesterday and our morning skate dictated the way we were going to play. Sometimes you learn the lesson hard."