Wahlstrom, Nelson lead Islanders past Blues

NEW YORK (AP) — Oliver Wahlstrom and Brock Nelson each scored, Ilya Sorokin made 27 saves and the New York Islanders beat the St. Louis Blues 2-1 on Saturday.

Sorokin had 14 stops in the third period as the Islanders snapped a two-game skid.

Robert Thomas scored for St. Louis and Jordan Binnington recorded 18 saves, but the Blues fell for the second straight game despite a late push.

Thomas cut the Blues’ deficit to one at 17:08 of the third period. Blues coach Craig Berube then pulled Binnington in favor of an extra attacker with over three minutes remaining in the game. Ryan O’Reilly and Brayden Schenn had opportunities to score the equalizer as the Blues controlled possession in the final minutes, but Sorokin preserved the Islanders’ advantage.

“Tough start to the game for us," Thomas said. ”We finally got going in the third, but we needed to do that for the first and second period.”

The Islanders took a two-goal lead on the power play early in the second period. Noah Dobson cleverly set up Nelson for a one-timer from the top of the right faceoff circle at 1:04. It was New York’s first goal on the man advantage since Feb. 20 against the Montreal Canadiens and Nelson’s 20th goal of the season.

“There wasn’t any room, it got nasty at times,” Islanders coach Barry Trotz said. “You had to make plays knowing you were going to get run over. We had blocked shots, good power play, good penalty kill, big saves, couple of fights, all of that. I thought it was exactly the type of game that we can play. It was one of those games you had to show up. If you didn’t show up, you’d get pushed out of the game.”

Wahlstrom opened the scoring at 6:36 of the first period when Binnington was unable to close off the short side and the puck