SAM DARCY'S confident return from a serious knee injury was the icing on the cake for the Western Bulldogs, just eight weeks after fears his season was over.

The 21-year-old was a constant threat up forward, finishing with three goals from 19 disposals as the Dogs jumped back into the top eight with a powerful 72-point win over St Kilda.

SAINTS V BULLDOGS Full match details and stats

The 20.12 (132) to 8.12 (60) victory was also the Bulldogs' highest score of the season, with 13 different goalkickers.

Coach Luke Beveridge was proud of his young charge's comeback, but hinted that he may be getting mistreated as a key forward.

"He was pretty good, 'Darce'. Obviously, they paid him a fair bit of attention. It's something that he's going to have to deal with from week to week, I think," Beveridge said.

"As long as he's treated like every other key forward, that's all that matters.

"But he fought through that, and I think it's difficult when you're in so much physical contact. He's obviously long, and [difficult to] stay disciplined and [give] no free kicks away and all that sort of stuff, especially when you're not getting any yourself.

"He just needs to sort of temper that, and I thought he was pretty good in the ruck too when he went in there. So, he's had a good night, a good return."

When prompted on some potential overzealous defending on Darcy, Beveridge refused to elaborate.

"It is what it is, and so we'll just keep working through that," he said.

An early knock to the ribs for star Marcus Bontempelli was something he was able to shake off, but working through the tag of Saint Marcus Windhager was a different story. While Bontempelli finished with just 14 disposals and three clearances, Beveridge was pleased with how his captain was able to adjust his game to offer teammates room to move.

"Windhager is a disciplined tagger, so Marcus (Bontempelli) obviously had his hands full there. (Windhager) did a pretty good job on [Kysaiah] Pickett against Melbourne the week before, and he's done a number of good jobs. Marcus still really worked through that," Beveridge said.

"And what that does, Marcus played a really selfless game tonight. It meant other players, teammates capitalised on that. He made one v twos, and it means we've got an extra somewhere… as much as you look at the stat sheet and see that Marcus didn't knock it out of the park with quantity, he played a real skipper's team game that helped everyone else."

Connection, decision making, and ball use were all a concern for the Saints, who struggled to chain possession together to generate any meaningful attack for the evening.

"We overused it a bit today … it was like it was wet. You needed to take the contest a bit more," St Kilda coach Ross Lyon said.

"I thought their big guys just dominated. Darcy, I thought [Callum] Wilkie did a great job on [Aaron] Naughton for the supply, but the other talls, they dominated. [Rory] Lobb's quality, Darcy shouldn't have been able to do what he did, right. But it was pretty good supply.

"I've got to stop talking here, but if you look at the mechanic, turning it over coming out of defence and going back in, how many of their 19 marks came off those turnovers? Like, the number's too big there."

St Kilda lost the mark count 94-121, the mark inside 50 count 10-19, and the contested marks 9-18, signalling the Western Bulldogs' pure aerial dominance for the game.

Bailey Williams (17 marks, three contested), and Darcy (nine marks, four contested) were able to lead that aerial game, limiting the impact that a somewhat undersized St Kilda side could have in that space. Lyon indicated the absence of Max King up forward and Dougal Howard in defence as an ongoing concern.

"Their intercept game, they dominated the air… which has been a theme against us all year. We're just a little bit short (at) either end," Lyon said.

 "We're better than what we displayed tonight but they seem to have our number," Lyon said.

"Even when we're doing everything right ... they were just slicker and more polished and they've got more quality and run deeper.

"That's where we aspire to get to, but there's no magic bullet in the AFL.

"You've got to do the work, do the time, and you've just got to keep adding talent."