It was Johnston’s second hat trick this season and third in the NHL.
“It’s really cool to have a chance to do that and see the hats falling on the ice,” Johnston said. “I think confidence is a huge thing. As a power play, just the way it feels right now, everyone just kind of has that swagger. When we go out there, it feels like we’re going to score every time.”
Roope Hintz had a goal and three assists, Mason Marchment and Matt Duchene each had a goal and an assist, and Thomas Harley had two assists for the Stars (39-19-2), who have won five of six and are 10-2-1 in their past 13 games. Jake Oettinger made 39 saves.
“Guys scored on our chances, and we played pretty well after that second period and closed it out the right way. You’re up by one and you need guys to step up and give you some breathing room, and we did that,” Oettinger said. “They threw everything at the net. Sometimes it’s almost nice when you’re getting a lot of rubber and in the rhythm of that. I would almost rather have what I had than what their guys had. You never know what is going to get thrown at you.”
Zack Bolduc, Dylan Holloway, and Nathan Walker scored for the Blues (29-27-6). Joel Hofer allowed three goals on nine shots in the first period before being replaced by Jordan Binnington, who allowed three goals on 12 shots in relief.
“We didn’t execute, we weren’t as aggressive as we have been, and you give a good power play like that time and space, they’re going to make tic-tac-toe plays, and they did that to us,” St. Louis coach Jim Montgomery said. “Our 5-on-5 game was pretty good, our special teams game we didn’t match.”
Marchment gave the Stars a 1-0 lead at 1:56 of the first period with a shot from the top of the right face-off circle for a power-play goal.
“Nice to get back on the board,” Marchment said. “Starting to feel a little bit more like myself. Not too many games played in the last couple of months. Just nice to kind of feel back to normal.”