Blues HC Montgomery refrains from complaining about refereeing vs Oilers to escape fine

St. Louis Blues coach Jim Montgomery chose not to publicly criticize the officiating following the 4-3 loss to the Edmonton Oilers on Wednesday night.

Late in the third, Nathan Walker was chasing a partial breakaway when Darnell Nurse dove and took out his legs, but no penalty was called. Moments later, Connor McDavid connected with Connor Brown, who buried the game-winner with 21 seconds remaining.

When asked about the non-call, Montgomery said (2:06):

"I'm not going to comment on refereeing because it's a fine, but the video—even the net came off at the end. It didn't come off by itself."

Jordan Kyrou, Pavel Buchnevich and Ryan Suter found the back of the net for the Blues, while Jordan Binnington turned aside 19 shots in the loss.

For the Oilers, Connor Brown scored twice, with Viktor Arvidsson and Vasily Podkolzin adding goals, while Calvin Pickard stopped 23 shots in the win.

On the game itself, Montgomery praised his team’s overall effort but also pointed out:

“Obviously, we didn't do a good enough job of checking McDavid and we didn't do a good enough job of defending our net front. I didn't think we did a good enough job of getting to their net front. The net-front battle was the difference in the game.”

The Blues fell to 43-30-7 with the loss, their second in a row after rattling off 12 straight wins.

"We’ve shown throughout here ever since 4 Nations that we’re a team that’s just going to keep coming. And I love that about our group." Montgomery added.

The Blues are back in action on Saturday night when they take on the Seattle Kraken.

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Game recap: Blues 4-3 loss against Oilers

In the first period, Ryan Suter got the Blues on the board first with a short-handed goal at 8:44. Connor Brown equalled the score at 1:30 of the second after McDavid had set him up at the side of the net.

Vasily Podkolzin gave the Oilers a 2-1 lead at 12:39, burying a rebound off a point shot from Darnell Nurse. Fourteen seconds into the third, Jordan Kyrou responded with a quick snap shot from the slot to make it 2-2.

A few minutes later, Viktor Arvidsson cleaned up a rebound to put Edmonton back on top, 3-2. Buchnevich scored on his own rebound at 5:23 to make it 3-3. Then, McDavid gave Brown front net pass for the game-winner to give the Oilers a 4-3 victory.