Defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk recently had a run of shootout goals in practice, but he was 0 for two when the game was on the line. Shattenkirk wasn't alone, as the Blues were winless in five shootouts prior to Saturday's game against Minnesota, just one for 17 combined on their attempts.

"I've got to make the next one count," Shattenkirk said a couple of weeks ago.

With the Blues able to solve Minnesota goaltender Josh Harding only twice on a season-high 49 shots through overtime Saturday, Shattenkirk had his chance and he made it count, scoring the lone goal of the shootout for a 3-2 victory over the Wild.

"I was telling Carlo (Colaiacovo) that it felt like I lost about 20 pounds when I came back to the bench," Shattenkirk said. "Even just getting one (shootout) goal and getting the win is going to be huge for us, just getting that confidence back that we need."

So now you can now check a shootout victory off the list for the Blues, who with 58 points climbed back into first place in the Central Division and second in the Western Conference. They improved to 10-0-2 in their last 12 games at Scottrade Center, where they will continue their five-game home-stand against Dallas on Monday.

As poor as the Blues have been in shootouts this season, it seemed to be the only way they would solve Harding on Saturday. He entered the game with a career record of 6-2 with a 1.69 goals-against average and a .940 save-percentage against the Blues, and he was sensational through overtime.

The Blues' offense registered 49 shots and had six power plays but netted goals from just David Perron and Alex Pietrangelo. After falling behind 1-0, the Blues took a 2-1 lead on Pietrangelo's second-period power-play goal. Then the Wild evened the score 2-2.

After 65 minutes of deadlocked play, a combined 66 penalty minutes, 52 hits and three fights, the Blues improved to 1-5 in shootouts as goaltender Jaroslav Halak broke a personal streak of nine straight shootout losses by stopping all three Wild attempts.

"That one had everything," Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said. "It had some scraps, great goaltending, great goals, lots of funny calls. It was just an old-fashioned Saturday night hockey game. If you came to the arena and watched tonight, for me, you got your money's worth because it had everything."

Fifty-eight seconds into the game, Minnesota's Justin Falk laid a big, clean hit on Perron, who went down. With Perron missing 97 games with a concussion, the red flag went up for David Backes, who dropped the gloves with Falk.

Backes was lost for the remainder of the period, receiving 19 penalty minutes, including a 10-minute misconduct. The Blues were minus Backes, but the Wild were also without their captain, Mikko Koivu, who left in the first period with an upper-body injury after a hit by the Blues' Vladimir Sobotka.

With Koivu's team-high 33 points in the locker room, David McIntyre netted his first goal of the season, giving Minnesota a 1-0 lead with 12:47 left in the first period.

The Blues would outshoot Minnesota 13-1 the rest of the period for a total of 17-4 but failed to score, snapping a streak of 10 consecutive home games with a first-period goal. In the second period, Perron exacted some revenge, however, scoring his third goal of the season to tie the game 1-1 with 11:56 left in the period.

The Blues had six power plays and scored on just one. Pietrangelo netted his seventh goal of the season, sliding into the slot and poking the puck past Harding for a 2-1 advantage with 9:21 left in the second period. That extended Pietrangelo's career-high point streak to six games (two goals, seven assists).

Halak protected the Blues' lead for a stretch of time, turning aside a series of shots from Minnesota's Dany Heatley and Devin Setoguchi during one sequence. But a short time later, Jared Spurgeon's point shot grazed a puck off Halak's glove for a 2-2 score with 3:28 left in the period.

Halak made up for it in the shootout, looking calm considering the recent history of the team and himself.

"I'm 0-5, so if you lose I'm 0-6, it doesn't matter ... at least you get one point," Halak said, laughing. "When I seen ‘Shatty' score the goal for us, I told myself, ‘This is the chance for us.' "

The Blues' bench erupted when Halak denied Setoguchi to end the game.

"I think this was a big weight off of everybody's shoulders," Hitchcock said. "We were shocked we scored a (shootout) goal, and we were even more shocked when we won. That's as much joy as I've seen on a bench in a long time when we won a shootout."