ST. LOUIS – David Backes had two goals and two assists, and Jaroslav Halak made 19 saves to lift the St. Louis Blues to a 4-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday night.
The Blues are 8-0-1 in January, earning 17 of 18 points, and Halak is 11-0-3 in his past 14 starts.
St. Louis is an NHL-best 21-3-3 at home and has 64 points overall, one fewer than Western Conference-leading Detroit.
Buffalo, which dropped its 12th straight on the road and fifth in a row overall, is 2-7-1 in January.
B.J. Crombeen and David Perron also scored for the Blues, and Alex Pietrangelo and T.J. Oshie each added two assists for St. Louis.
Ryan Miller made 23 saves for Buffalo, which got goals from Mike Weber and Tyler Myers.
Halak was coming off back-to-back shutouts, but his hopes for a third were dashed early when Weber scored his first goal since March 12, just 3:47 in.
Weber's goal from the left circle snapped Halak's shutout streak at 164 minutes, 38 seconds, but that was all Halak allowed until one minute remained.
Crombeen tied it 1-1 at 7:45 of the second period when he beat Miller with a wrist shot from the right circle for his first goal since March 30. Perron put the Blues on top 5:28 later when he deflected home Oshie's shot from the left circle.
Backes made it 3-1 with a power-play goal at 11:35 of the third period. After Myers scored a power-play goal with 1 minute left to cut it to 3-2, Backes sealed the Blues' win with an empty-net goal with 34.9 seconds left.
NOTES: Pietrangelo extended his career-best point streak to nine games. ... The Sabres have not won a road game since winning at Nashville on Dec. 3. ... Buffalo has been outscored 50-17 during its road skid. ... St. Louis has scored just six goals in its last three games, all wins. The Blues have allowed just two goals in that span. ... The Sabres hadn't played at St. Louis since Dec. 27, 2009.
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