Round Two For Blues

April 30, 1998 / 2:37 AM EDT / CBS/AP

The sweet toot of a referee's whistle signaled playoff nirvana for the St. Louis Blues. The short, sharp blast meant no game-tying goal for the Los Angeles Kings.

It was yet another break for the Blues in a 2-1 victory Wednesday night that gave them a 4-0 sweep of the first-round series.

The Blues became the first NHL team to advance, something they failed to do last year when they were beaten in the first round by eventual Stanley Cup champion Detroit.

"We got all the breaks in this one," Blues defenseman Al MacInnis said. "The Kings probably deserved a little more fate than what they got."

What Los Angeles didn't get that might have forced overtime was the game-tying goal in the third period.

The Kings, making their first playoff appearance in five years, closed the gap to 2-1 eight minutes into the third on Jozef Stumpel's goal. That revived the sellout crowd of 16,005 at the Forum, which got even louder barely two minutes later.

That's when Glen Murray redirected a shot the Kings and the crowd believed was the game-tying goal at 9:50. Murray's redirection slowed down when it hit Blues goalie Grant Fuhr, but it kept moving and slid 2 inches over the goal line.

But referee Stephen Walkom, who was too far away to see the puck go in, whistled the play dead, and the goal didn't count. The crowd showered trash on the ice and repeatedly shouting expletives.

"Getting that goal called back was a huge lift for us," said Craig Conroy, whose first career playoff goal put St. Louis ahead 2-0. "They had us running around. They came out strong; they weren't giving up by any means."

Unlike his teammates on the bench, Fuhr knew the score wasn't going to change on the play. He made 29 saves for his fourth straight victory in the series.

"I heard the whistle, so you stop worrying about the puck after you hear the whistle," he said. "We're happy to get rid of them now. That team is only going to get better."

With about five minutes remaining, Fuhr kicked out a shot by Vladimir Tsyplakov and the Kings went on to their third straight one-goal loss after being routed 8-3 in the series opener.

"Outside of the first game, we played them real tough," Kings forward Ray Ferraro said. "But we made some mistakes. We took too many penalties and they got big goals when they needed them and we didn't."

Pavol Demitra, who had two goals and an assist in Game 1, gave St. Louis a 1-0 lead at 8:05 of the second period when he scored on a rebound feed from Geoff Courtnall, who got the pass off despite being checked from behind by Aki Berg.

The Kings survived a scare moments earlier when Steve Duchesne broke out of the penalty box and had the puck cleared to him. Stephane Fiset came out of the net attepting to smother the puck, but he went by Duchesne, who never got the shot off.

Conroy put St. Louis ahead 2-0 at 3:22 of the third. Fiset made the initial save of Conroy's wrist shot from the right circle with his blocker, but the puck went up in the air and deflected off the knob of Fiset's stick into the net.

"I had a good head of steam and I came over flying. The `D' was coming on me so I just decided to throw it at the net and hope for the best," Conroy said. "(The puck) hit something. I don't know what it hit, but it was kind of a knuckleball going in there. I was never so happy to see a puck go in the net, just to give us a little cushion."

Fiset stopped 32 shots in his first start since getting pulled in the 13th minute of the second period of Game 1 after allowing five goals on 27 shots.

Jamie Storr, who replaced Fiset in the opener and then lost the next two games, did not play after being diagnosed Wednesday with post-concussion syndrome. His head was knocked into the crossbar on a hit by Geoff Courtnall in Monday night's game, which the Kings lost 4-3.

"I knew they were going to come after me a bit, especially if the score got out of hand," Courtnall said. "Early on, they took a couple (hits), but it wasn't too bad. It wasn't as bad as I thought it might be."

The crowd booed Courtnall, whose younger brother, Russ, plays for the Kings, each time he touched the puck early in the game. The Kings played Geoff tight, and wound up drawing some penalties.

"It wasn't part of our game plan to go after Geoff, but emotion gets in the way in the heat of the moment," Matt Johnson said. "You couldn't let him skate by you without giving him a jab, and that's what we were doing, and we got caught."