"The Blues admitted in recent days that after a nine-day layoff, they might be rusty in the opening period of Friday's game against Los Angeles. The word to describe their play began with an "r," but restless was a more accurate description.

The club rang up 12 shots and 15 hits in the first period and showed no signs of taking the longest break of any team in the NHL.

"We started out pretty good actually, but I don't know how that was because I felt terrible," the Blues' Matt D'Agostini said. "I couldn't skate."

Evidently D'Agostini found his legs, which he used to create the only scoring play of the game. D'Agostini set up Jamie Langenbrunner for his fourth goal of the season, and goaltender Jaroslav Halak made it stand with a 22-save shutout, his fourth in his last seven games.

"For the first game out of the box, it was a great playoff game," Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said. "I'm really happy with the way we competed. I thought the first period was as good as we've played in a month."

The Blues' narrow victory ended a two-game winless skid and improved the team to 14-0-3 in its last 17 games at Scottrade Center. They stretched their league-best record at home to 22-3-4."