ST. LOUIS — With No. 11, the Blues have people thinking about '19.

The Blues beat the Penguins, 5-4 in overtime, on Thursday night, extending their win streak to 11, tying the franchise record set in 2019 before the Blues went on to win the Stanley Cup. The Blues also set a new franchise record with their 10th straight home win.

Robert Thomas scored the game-winning goal on the power play for St. Louis with 2:48 remaining in overtime. Jordan Kyrou drew a slashing penalty to put the Blues on the power play.

Pittsburgh's Rutger McGroarty tied the game at 4 with 23.8 seconds remaining in the third period to send the game to overtime. It was his first career NHL goal.

Jake Neighbours scored twice, as the Blues also received goals from Pavel Buchenvich and Kyrou, and 24 saves from Joel Hofer. Jimmy Snuggerud picked up his first NHL point with a primary assist on Neighbours' second goal.

The win moved the Blues (91 points with five games remaining) two points ahead of the Wild (89 points with six games remaining) for the first wild card in the Western Conference. Minnesota owns the tiebreaker since it has 33 regulation wins to the Blues' 30 regulation wins.

Bryan Rust, Connor Dewar and Rickard Rakell (power play) also scored for the Penguins.

The Blues will close their homestand by hosting the Avalanche on Saturday.

Holloway out

Blues forward Dylan Holloway suffered a lower-body injury in the first period and did not return for the final two periods.

Holloway appeared to get injured on a hit by Pittsburgh’s Rutger McGroarty with 2:51 remaining in the first period. Holloway just led a 3 on 1 rush up the ice that was shut down by Kris Letang, and McGroarty checked Holloway in the corner after that. On Holloway’s next shift, he was on the ice for 14 seconds before returning to the bench.

Holloway has not missed a game this season. His only previous injury scare came on Nov. 5, when he was hospitalized after being hit in the neck by a puck.

Holloway was one of many Blues that were hurt at some point on Thursday night.

Thomas was hurt on a Rakell shot in the second period, laying on the ice as the Penguins controlled the puck in the Blues end. When Thomas got to his feet and back in the play, Dewar stuffed a rebound at the net-front to give Pittsburgh a 2-1 lead after Neighbours tied the game at 1.

Thomas retreated to the Blues dressing room after the Dewar goal, and returned simultaneously as Buchnevich scored to tie the game at 2 at 6:48 of the second period. Nathan Walker forced a turnover in the neutral zone with an open-ice hit, allowing Buchnevich to speed past former Blues forward Kevin Hayes and finish with a backhand around Tristan Jarry.

Justin Faulk drew a hooking call on Erik Karlsson, but then his face crashed into the post. On the ensuing power play, Oskar Sundqvist was high-sticked in the face by Ryan Shea, drawing a double-minor on Pittsburgh. And then Brayden Schenn took a cross-check in the back from Ryan Graves that required attention on the Blues bench.

Fowler does it again

Blues defenseman Cam Fowler had two points on Tuesday night to lead St. Louis to its 10th straight win, and he made another big play during the second period on Thursday against Pittsburgh.

Fowler's high flip from the corner of his own zone landed perfectly for Kyrou just inside the Pittsburgh blue line, and Kyrou did the rest. Kyrou just kept himself onside, and then beat Jarry for his 33rd goal of the season.

Fowler entered Thursday night with 30 points in his 45 games with the Blues, which was 14th in the NHL among defensemen. Since the break, only six NHL defensemen had more than Fowler's 16 points.

On Tuesday night, Fowler assisted on the game-tying goal in the final minute of the third period and then scored the overtime winner himself.

A rarity of a first

For just the fourth time in the 21 games since the 4 Nations break, the Blues were outshot in the first period on Thursday night as Pittsburgh owned an 8-4 edge in shots and a 1-0 lead on the scoreboard at the end of 20 minutes.

At one point, the Blues went 13:08 between shots on goal, a streak that ended with Faulk’s shot from the blue line with 34 seconds remaining in the period. The Blues had five giveaways in the period, and iced the puck three times.

Rust scored for Pittsburgh at 3:32 of the first period, dancing his way from the wall to the crease, deking Joel Hofer to his right and then sliding the puck into the vacant net. Rust’s goal came less than two minutes after Graves avoided a delay of game penalty when he flipped the puck over the penalty box glass from just inside the blue line.

This season, the NHL allowed challenges for delay of game penalties, but only to take a penalty off the board. If there was no penalty called, a challenge is not permitted to add one. Thus, the Blues could not challenge the call on the ice.

The minus-4 shot margin for the Blues was the worst differential in the first period since they were minus-5 in the first game back from the break vs. Winnipeg on Feb. 22.

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