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ELMONT, N.Y. — The Blues are waiting for an outburst that hasn’t arrived yet.

In a 3-1 loss to the Islanders on Saturday night at UBS Arena, the Blues once again struggled to score, as Jake Neighbours’ power-play goal in the third period was their only goal of the evening. It was the fourth time this season that the Blues failed to score a goal at 5 on 5, and led to their seventh loss in the last night games.

“We score two goals a game,� Blues forward Pavel Buchnevich said. “We can’t win the games like that. Our goalies have to stop 50 shots every game. It’s impossible. Our team has good players, and we’re not scoring. We’ve got to figure out offense. Offense is our biggest issue. Impossible to win with one and two goals. Just impossible.�

Kyle Palmieri scored twice for the Islanders, once off a Pierre-Olivier Jospeh giveaway in the first period and then into an empty net during the final minute of the third period. Brock Nelson added a power-play goal in the second period for New York.

Jordan Binnington made 28 saves for the Blues in his first chance to become the team’s all-time winningest goaltender.

The Blues made a third-period push after being down 2-0 at second intermission, and finished with a 10-7 edge in shots on goal in the final 20 minutes.

“I don’t think we did enough to get pucks to the net to create that chaos (early on),� Blues coach Drew Bannister said. “I thought in the second half, we started putting more pucks to the net. Once you do that, I thought our retrievals were good. We were finding pucks and we were winning wall battles.

“In that second half, just because we were putting them back on their toes a little bit and they had to collapse to the net, we were able to get more movement. I thought that was something we didn’t do in the first half.�

At 5 on 5, in the third period, the Blues had 19 shot attempts to the Islanders’ eight. Buchnevich attributed the change to an adjustment to the way they exited their own zone.

“We changed the breakout and we started playing better,� Buchnevich said. “At least we got the speed on breakout when we dump the puck. Every time we dumped the puck (in the) first period, never get the puck back and just chasing (the) puck around. As soon as we changed the breakout, at least we enter the zone with the speed and we can forecheck.�

Saturday’s outcome wasn’t an outlier for the Blues.

They have not scored four goals in a game since Nov. 2, a streak of 10 games that is the longest active one in the NHL. They have scored three regulation goals in just one game in their last nine tries. In more than half of their games this season (12 out of 22), the Blues have scored two or fewer goals.

“Obviously, we’re struggling to score goals and we’ve got to find ways to not necessarily be chasing the game in the third period,� Blues defenseman Justin Faulk said. “We’ve got to come out with that aggression early, and create those chances and that opportunity and that amount of time in the o-zone earlier in the game so we can give ourselves a chance to be up in a game.�

For a dozen games, it was understandable that the Blues would struggle offensively without No. 1 center Robert Thomas. And they’re still without Philip Broberg, who is second among Blues defensemen in scoring despite missing the last 10 games with a lower-body injury.

But captain Brayden Schenn is on pace for 11 goals this season. Brandon Saad has scored in one game in his last 15. Jordan Kyrou just ended a six-game goal drought on Thursday. Faulk doesn’t have a point in the last 14 games. Buchnevich has one even-strength goal in his last 19 games.

What are the issues offensively?

“I don’t know, we doesn’t work on it,� Buchnevich said. “We’re working only on d-zone. We’ve got to start working on offense, believing we can score. It’s hard to win in this league 2-1 or 1-0. I think we play defensively much better than last year, but we doesn’t create any chances offensively. It’s our biggest issue right now. Probably the lowest team in goals.�

Faulk: “At times, you’ve just got to get aggressive and shoot pucks and spend time. Realistically, we’ve got to make it hard on them. Generate chances with speed, no turnovers, play fast through the neutral zone so you can get guys up in the rush and put pressure on them and make it tough. So it’s not just a shot off the rush or one chance and then they break it out.�

Overall this season, the Blues are in the bottom third of the NHL in terms of generating offense at 5 on 5, according to Natural Stat Trick. They are 25th in shot attempts, 23rd in shots on goal, 25th in scoring chances, 26th in high-danger chances, 30th in expected goals and 25th in goals.

×îÐÂÐÓ°ÉÔ­´´ has preached an identity this season that revolves around playing tight-checking, low-scoring hockey. It understands it’s not a flashy team, and does not try to be one. For the Blues, they want their game to begin in their own zone.

“You have to be able to defend first,� Bannister said. “If you want to have the puck, you have to defend fast. I thought in the second half of the game, we defended faster. I think it allowed us to play a quicker game and get on the offense. But you have to defend first. You have to be able to get the puck back when you don’t have it to be able to have it.�

Faulk conceded that the Blues could open it up offensively, but those rush-based teams generally don’t have much success. When they do, it’s centered around players like Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon that “get to play a little bit different probably,� Faulk said.

“You’ve got to be tight defensively,� Faulk said. “You don’t want to give up too many chances and then you end up chasing the game anyways. I don’t think the answer is to just open it wide open and just start hoping for rush goals.�

So the Blues (9-12-1) will have to find a balance in the meantime, and they will have to do so against two of the top teams in the league when they face the Rangers and Devils this week.

“When you have those opportunities at even-strength, you’ve got to be able to capitalize on them,� Bannister said. “Right now, we haven’t been able to.�