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Flames hit break on high note

David Moss had two goals and an assist Wednesday night as the surging Calgary Flames beat the St. Louis Blues 4-1 for their fourth straight win.
Alexander Steen, Miikka Kiprusoff
St Louis Blue Alexander Steen is stopped by Calgary Flames goalie Miikka Kiprusoff during the Flames 4-1 win in Calgary

Flames 4 Blues 1

CALGARY — David Moss had two goals and an assist Wednesday night as the surging Calgary Flames beat the St. Louis Blues 4-1 for their fourth straight win.

Calgary took the lead for good 5:34 into the game thanks to an error by St. Louis Louis defenceman Erik Johnson.

Goaltender Ty Conklin stuck out his pad to stop Moss’s snapshot from the wing. But as the rebound bounced into the slot, Johnson misplayed his clearing attempt firing it straight into his own net.

As the 22-year-old sat shaking his head on the Blues bench, highlights of the blooper were shown over and over again on the scoreboard video screen to the roars of the sellout Scotiabank Saddledome crowd of 19,289.

Adam Pardy and Jarome Iginla into an empty net also scored for Calgary (24-21-6).

Philip McRae, son of former NHL player Basil McRae, scored his first career goal for St. Louis (22-20-7).

Calgary enters the all-star break playing its best hockey of the season.

The Flames have won four straight, are a sizzling 10-3-3 in their last 16 games and have climbed to within two points of a playoff spot in the Western Conference.

A reason for that success has been special teams. Calgary has scored two power-play goals in consecutive games after going 17 contests without accomplishing that feat. The penalty-killing unit is a perfect 14-for-14 during the win streak.

St. Louis is heading the other direction. The reeling Blues are 2-8-2 in their last dozen and have fallen into a tie with Columbus for 13th place in the West.

Calgary doubled its lead 1:29 into the second period when Moss deflected Anton Babchuk’s wrist shot past Conklin on the power play.

It’s been two goals or none for Moss of late. Moss has racked up eight goals in his last 12 games, that coming on four two-goal games.

The 2-0 lead would be all the offence Flames goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff would need in his 500th career game. With his short slump from the past couple weeks clearly behind him, Kiprusoff made 28 saves to improve to 20-18-2.

Kiprusoff was busiest in the second turning aside all 12 shots he faced but his best stops came in the third. In stifling the Blues comeback attempt, Kiprusoff stuck out a pad to thwart Alex Steen on a breakaway and made a spectacular glove grab to rob Alex Pietrangelo on a dangerous backhand.

Since a rough six-game patch in which Kiprusoff went 1-2-1, got pulled twice and gave up 22 goals, the 34-year-old Finn has won three straight and only given up five goals in that span while stopping 92 shots.