Recap: St. Louis vs. Dallas

St. Louis, MO (Sports Network) - Ryan Reaves' second-period marker proved to be the difference as the St. Louis Blues held off the Dallas Stars, 2-1, on Friday at Scottrade Center.

Chris Stewart added a power-play goal and Brian Elliott posted 21 saves for the Blues, who have won three straight and sit firmly in the sixth spot in the Western Conference with 54 points.

"I thought we just managed the game today and did a good job," St. Louis coach Ken Hitchcock said. "We found a way to win."

Antoine Roussel registered the lone Dallas goal, while Kari Lehtonen allowed both St. Louis goals on 20 shots for the Stars, who had won six of their last seven coming in.

With 47 points, Dallas finds itself two back of the Columbus Blue Jackets for the eighth and final playoff spot in the West with four games to play.

A boarding penalty against Dallas forward Eric Nystrom at the 9:39 mark of the first period gave St. Louis an early man advantage, and the Blues quickly capitalized. Alex Pietrangelo's blast from the top of the left circle was fought off by Lehtonen, but Stewart was there on the low right side to bury the rebound for a 1-0 lead at 10:10.

St. Louis doubled its edge just under eight minutes into the second, when Reaves intercepted a clearing attempt at the Dallas blue line and made his way to the front of the net before pounding home a rebound of a Chris Porter miss to make it 2-0 at the 7:52 mark.

Dallas cut the margin in half early in the third, when Stephane Robidas rifled a shot from above the right circle that deflected off Roussel before sailing high over the blocker side of Elliott to make it 2-1 at the 4:37 mark.

Lehtonen left the net with a little over a minute remaining to give the Stars an extra attacker, but Dallas was unable to find the equalizer and the Blues escaped with the victory.

"Not too many mistakes today, we were playing great defense and so were they. They just got one more goal than us," Lehtonen said.