Gameday 92 (Sat, 20 Apr) - Results

Pittsburgh v Boston 3-2 - Jarome Iginla disappointed Boston again. One month after choosing a trade to the Pittsburgh Penguins over one to the Boston Bruins, Iginla made sure his first game against the Bruins since leaving Calgary was a victorious one for his new team Saturday afternoon. Iginla's power-play goal 4:43 into the third period put the Penguins ahead to stay in a 3-2 win against the Bruins at TD Garden. The game was played Saturday after it was postponed Friday due to the manhunt for a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing. Pittsburgh, which has won its past six visits to TD Garden and six in a row overall, clinched the top seed in the Eastern Conference. The Penguins again played without injured Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, James Neal and Paul Martin, who have missed varying amounts of time in the past month. But Pittsburgh locked up first place with four games remaining. Late last month, the Calgary Flames made a deal with the Bruins to send Iginla to Boston, but Iginla invoked his no-trade clause and the Flames then made a deal with the Penguins. Iginla made the Bruins regret how things went down even more when he released a slap shot from the blue line that eluded Tuukka Rask through the five-hole early in the third period. Brad Marchand had just been called for roughing after he tried to get Jussi Jokinen to fight. Boston fans booed Iginla every time he touched the puck. Pittsburgh defenseman Kris Letang scored a power-play goal at 8:29 of the third period to give the Penguins a 3-1 lead. Vokoun stopped 38 shots. Marchand and Tyler Seguin scored for Boston, which has lost four in a row (0-3-1). Boston outshot (13-5) and outscored (1-0) Pittsburgh in the first period, but it didn't take long for the Penguins to tie the game in the second. Jokinen won a battle in front of the Bruins net and roofed a backhand shot from the slot while falling down at 5:10. The Bruins were greeted by another touching tribute to the victims and heroes of the Boston Marathon bombings from Monday, similar to the one prior to Boston's game against the Buffalo Sabres on Wednesday. The teams took the ice with the lights dimmed for the second straight game, then watched a music video highlighting the capture of the suspect Friday. The video was similar to the one shown before Wednesday's game, only with the triumphant ending of the manhunt drawing a raucous cheer from the crowd. The Bruins rode the emotion again to an early goal. Marchand skated from his end, eluded Letang at the left dot then beat Vokoun with a snap shot between the torso and arm, giving the Bruins a 1-0 lead at 10:18. The intense first period cost the Bruins one of their best players, however, when Nathan Horton left the game with 2:04 remaining with an injury after a fight with Iginla. Horton didn't return. Seguin scored with three seconds left in the game to make it 3-2.

Florida v New Jersey 2-6 - The Devils (17-17-10, 44 points) will play New York twice at Madison Square Garden, on Sunday and next Saturday. Sandwiched are home games against the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday and Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday. After spotting the Panthers a two-goal lead eight minutes into the first period, the Devils scored six unanswered goals and yielded six shots the remainder of the game. The six goals were the most by the Devils this season and coincided with Ilya Kovalchuk's return. Though he didn't register a point, Kovalchuk, who was removed from injured reserve earlier in the day after missing 11 straight with a right-shoulder injury, remained involved and creative while earning a team-high 22:43 of ice time on a line with center Adam Henrique and left wing Dainius Zubrus. Devils forward David Clarkson, who finished with a game-high eight shots and one huge hit on Panthers defenseman Brian Campbell in the offensive end at 12:48 of the first period that seemed to ignite the team, said he was glad to see Kovalchuk back in the lineup. The Devils received a pair of goals by Elias, and single scores from Clarkson, Zubrus, Ryan Carter and Stephen Gionta. Brodeur, who stopped Quinton Howden on a penalty shot early in the third, earned his 12th victory of the season with 11 saves. Brodeur, who had an assist on Elias' first goal, has stopped eight of 11 career penalty shots. The Devils are 11-3-2 when Kovalchuk and Brodeur are in the lineup together this season. The victory was the fourth for the Devils in 26 games when allowing the opening goal. The Panthers (13-25-6, 32 points), eliminated from playoff contention, have lost five straight and been outscored 27-8 over that stretch. Trailing 2-0, DeBoer called a timeout and his team responded with five straight goals in the second period. Clarkson, who played a spirited game throughout, snapped a 2-2 tie when he scored his team-leading 14th goal of the season 10:45 into the second. Travis Zajac and Clarkson found themselves 2-on-1 against Panthers defenseman Dmitry Kulikov low in the crease before Zajac fed Clarkson, who beat goalie Jacob Markstrom on the short-side post. Carter extended the lead to 4-2 when he battled for a puck in the left-wing corner, spun away from defender Mike Weaver and skated to the left post before jamming home his own rebound at 14:11. Carter assisted linemate Gionta to give the Devils a 5-2 edge a little over three minutes later when the latter's wrist shot from the top of the left circle eluded Markstrom, who had been pulled in two of his previous three starts. Howden was awarded his penalty shot 39 seconds into the third period after being hooked from behind by Devils defenseman Marek Zidlicky, but Brodeur got the best of the 21-year-old rookie when he denied a quick snap shot from between the circles with his right pad. It was Brodeur's second denial of a penalty shot this season, the first coming April 10. Zubrus gave New Jersey a 6-2 lead when he redirected a blast from the right point by Adam Larsson 10:28 into the third. The goal was the second of the season for Zubrus, his first since Jan. 27. Elias scored his second goal of the game 2:09 into the second period to pull his team even, 2-2. After receiving a pass from Clarkson at the left hash, Elias took a quick wrist shot that beat Markstrom to the short side. Zajac made the play possible when he forced a turnover at the right point and quickly dished to Clarkson in the right circle. It was the first two-goal game for Elias since Dec. 17, 2011, a 5-3 victory over the Montreal Canadiens. Elias barely missed at recording his first hat trick since April 1, 2011 when he moved in tight on Markstrom with just under 12 minutes left in the second but was denied by a splendid left-pad save. The Panthers opened a 2-0 lead on a power-play goal by Marcel Goc and even-strength marker by Brian Campbell in a span of 1:06 in the opening eight minutes. Elias opened the scoring for the Devils with a power-play goal at 14:22. After gathering a pass from Peter Harrold in the neutral zone, Elias skated past three Florida players before unleashing a wrist shot from between the circles that beat Markstrom to the short side. Brodeur notched his second assist of the season, the 42nd of his career.

NY Islanders v Winnipeg 5-4 - The New York Islanders needed a win Saturday to firm up their path to the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Winnipeg Jets needed a win to give their postseason hopes a fighting chance. The Jets managed to force overtime when Bryan Little scored on a power play with 2:01 remaining in regulation, but John Tavares scored the deciding goal in the shootout to give the Islanders a 5-4 victory at MTS Centre. New York got goals from three of its four lines, courtesy of Frans Nielsen, Josh Bailey, Matt Martin and Michael Grabner, and Evgeni Nabokov stopped 24 shots. Kyle Wellwood scored twice for Winnipeg, which got a goal from Zach Bogosian and 29 saves from Ondrej Pavelec. Neither club has reached the postseason since 2007, but they staged playoff-caliber hockey in a game that closed the Jets' 5-0-1 homestand and extended the Islanders' winning streak to three. New York's Brad Boyes and Winnipeg captain Andrew Ladd exchanged shootout goals before Tavares beat Pavelec through the pads to give the Islanders their 14th win in 21 road games. The Islanders are 8-0-2 in their past 10 and were happy to escape Winnipeg with two more points. The loss has the Jets at 49 points and in ninth place in the Eastern Conference, where they have been anchored for much of April, unable to make up ground despite taking 11 of 12 points at home. They sit one point behind the eighth-place New York Rangers, who have played one fewer game. The Islanders, who are closing out the regular season on a five-game road trip, moved past the Ottawa Senators into sixth place, where they are tied at 53 points with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Ottawa played Toronto on Saturday night. Unlike the Islanders, Senators and Rangers, the Jets have a pair of paths to the playoffs. If they can overtake the Washington Capitals, who played the Montreal Canadiens at Bell Centre on Saturday night, the Jets would win the Southeast Division title and claim home ice in the first round. In lieu of conquering Washington, the Jets can target the Senators or Rangers for a playoff berth. With the Islanders trying to close out a late 4-3 lead, created by Grabner's goal with 10:47 to play, the visitors ran into trouble. Lubomir Visnovsky's interference minor with 2:08 left in regulation gave the Jets a power play. Coach Claude Noel pulled Pavelec for a sixth skater, and Little needed seven seconds to stuff a rebound past Nabokov. Over the course of the match, the Jets overcame three Islanders leads. The Islanders' second line of Bailey, Nielsen and Kyle Okposo tormented the Jets early, with Nielsen and Bogosian exchanging first-period scores. Ladd assisted on Bogosian's goal and extended his scoring streak to a career-high seven games. Then, 1:28 after Bogosian's goal, Bailey and Okposo combined to give New York another one-goal lead. Martin's goal midway through the second period put the Jets down by two. Kyle Wellwood answered for Winnipeg 40 seconds after Martin's goal. Wellwood's second of the game (his first two-goal game since April 1, 2010) came 2:57 later and tied the game 3-3. Grant Clitsome's long outlet pass reached Wellwood at the Islanders' blue line. He settled the puck, outraced Visnovsky and Thomas Hickey, and beat Nabokov glove-side at 13:24. Midway through the third period, Grabner's 16th of the season broke a 3-3 tie. Colin McDonald scooped a puck out of the right corner and centered it into Pavelec's crease, where Grabner stuffed it and temporarily quieted what had been a rambunctious Winnipeg crowd.

Washington v Montreal 5-1 - The Washington Capitals quickly bounced back from a minor blip in their run toward the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Montreal Canadiens plunged right back into the defensive troubles that have defined them ever since they clinched a postseason berth. Alex Ovechkin and Troy Brouwer scored two goals apiece and Braden Holtby made 35 saves as the Capitals erased the memory of a 3-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators by beating the Canadiens 5-1 on Saturday for their ninth win in 10 games. The Canadiens (27-13-5) have allowed 25 goals in compiling a 1-4-0 record since clinching a playoff spot April 11, and defenseman Josh Gorges said he's seen just about enough. The Capitals (25-18-2) were anything but soft in extending their lead to three points atop the Southeast Division on the Winnipeg Jets (23-19-3), who collected a point in a 5-4 shootout loss at home to the New York Islanders earlier Saturday. The Capitals now return home after a two-game swing through Eastern Canada to await a showdown with the Jets at Verizon Center on Tuesday. Ovechkin scored his League-leading 29th and 30th goals of the season and added an assist, while linemate Nicklas Backstrom had a goal and an assist. Mike Ribeiro had three assists. Ovechkin now has 21 goals and 10 assists in his past 20 games, while Backstrom has four goals and 21 assists in the same period. When you play with the League's hottest player, sometimes your own career season can get lost in the shuffle. Meanwhile, the Canadiens continued their uncharacteristically poor defensive play since clinching April 11 following a 5-1 win at the Buffalo Sabres, perhaps eliminating any of the good will they may have garnered with a 3-2 win against the Tampa Bay Lightning at home on Thursday. Montreal now has allowed 25 goals on 149 shots in its past five games, a save percentage of .832. Carey Price, who has allowed 19 of those 25 goals, allowed the second and third shots he faced to beat him Saturday before the game was six minutes old, and he gave up four goals on 11 shots by the 7:50 mark of the second period. A Canadiens team that played with the lead for the great majority of its first 40 games now has held a lead for just 21:50 in its past five. Max Pacioretty scored Montreal's lone goal, while Price finished his night with 20 saves. Despite the team's slide, the Canadiens remain two points ahead of the Boston Bruins atop the Northeast Division after Boston's 3-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins earlier in the day. The Bruins, however, hold two games in hand, and will make up one of those games Sunday at home against the Florida Panthers. Ovechkin gave the Capitals an early lead by taking advantage of a P.K. Subban turnover deep in Montreal's end. Ovechkin collected the puck on his opposite wing and broke in on goal on a sharp angle. He faked a pass to the middle and quickly snapped a shot between Price's legs at 4:49 of the first. Just 68 seconds later, Brouwer curled off an offensive-zone faceoff win by Ribeiro and took a harmless looking wrist shot that got through a crowd and past Price at 5:57. Brouwer scored his second of the game at 3:49 of the second on a wrister from the slot that beat Price to the stick side, and Backstrom made it 4-0 at 7:50 of the second with a tap-in off an Ovechkin feed on the power play. Ovechkin scored his 30th at 13:23 of the third, one-timing a Mike Green feed that squeezed through Price's legs to make it 5-0. The Canadiens broke up Holtby's shutout bid at 14:51 of the third when Pacioretty converted a feed from Plekanec. The Canadiens will head out on the road for three games to close the season, starting in New Jersey on Tuesday, meaning their next game at Bell Centre will be a playoff game.

Toronto v Ottawa 4-1 - The Toronto Maple Leafs are heading to the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Maple Leafs earned their first postseason berth in eight seasons Saturday, defeating the Ottawa Senators 4-1 in front of 20,500 raucous fans at Scotiabank Place. Toronto, which got 49 saves from James Reimer, was helped by the New York Islanders' shootout victory over the Winnipeg Jets on Saturday afternoon, allowing the Maple Leafs to achieve 25 regulation and overtime wins and holding the Jets to 21. The Jets can tie the Maple Leafs in points, but with three games remaining can have no more than 24 regulation and overtime wins, giving Toronto the advantage should it come to a tiebreaker. The Maple Leafs (25-15-3) are in fifth place in the Eastern Conference; the Senators fell to seventh (23-15-6) behind the Islanders with four games to go. Toronto's Nazem Kadri beat Ottawa goaltender Craig Anderson five-hole at 14:10 of the third, making it 3-1, and Joffrey Lupul put the game away for the Maple Leafs with less than two minutes remaining. James van Riemsdyk scored twice, and Cody Franson and Phil Kessel each had two assists for Toronto, whose most recent playoff appearance was in 2004, when it lost in the second round. Jakob Silfverberg had the goal for the Senators. Anderson turned away 18 of 22 shots, and his three-game winning streak ended. Reimer continues to have the Senators' number; he's 8-1-1 lifetime against the divisional rival. Toronto nearly took its first lead when defenseman Dion Phaneuf shot from down low on Anderson and the goaltender swatted the puck into the air. Phaneuf recovered it and skated out to the half boards, where he sent another wrist shot toward Anderson that appeared to have the netminder beat. However, the referees ruled Leo Komarov interfered with Anderson and the goal was disallowed, leaving the game scoreless at 6:27. Ottawa's best chance in the first period came from Erik Condra. With just under five minutes left, the wing skated into the zone and fired on Reimer, forcing the goaltender to make a left-pad save. The puck popped to Condra and he made another attempt, but Reimer on his stomach sprawled to protect his crease. The Maple Leafs' ninth shot on goal was the lucky one, allowing Toronto to take a 1-0 lead 8:42 into the second period. Cody Franson's attempt from the point was deflected by the foot of van Riemsdyk and slipped through Anderson's five-hole at 8:42. Toronto made it 2-0 on a power-play goal after Zack Smith was called for high-sticking at 11:32. Kessel's shot from down low was blocked by Marc Methot, but the puck rebounded off the defenseman's body and found van Riemsdyk, who was able to catch Anderson out of position and score his second of the game. With 42 seconds left in the period, Ottawa got on the board after Lupul fanned on a backhand clearing attempt. Cory Conacher recovered the puck and set up Silfverberg with a cross-ice pass. The Swedish rookie fired a wrist shot from the top of the left faceoff circle, beating Reimer on his blocker side for his first goal in 12 games. With a handful of games left, the Senators have no time to lament the loss. Ottawa now prepares to square off against the top-seeded Pittsburgh Penguins on Monday.

Buffalo v Pittsburgh Postponed due to events in Boston

Philadelphia v Carolina 5-3 - Recording your first career hat trick on the road usually means settling for a little less fanfare. But not for Philadelphia Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds. When Simmonds slipped a bad-angle shot past Carolina Hurricanes goaltender Justin Peters at PNC Arena for his third of the night, the roars were immediate. So were the hats. More than two dozen littered the ice, and Simmonds made sure to tuck some souvenirs in his equipment bag. Simmonds' best offensive night in the NHL, four points in all, was the engine that drove the Flyers’ offense in a 5-3 win that was more dominant than the score suggests. Philadelphia came out ready to test the Hurricanes, with eight attempted shots in the first two minutes. They played a strong puck possession game, moved the puck well in transition and turned in several odd-man rushes. Not bad for a team playing its first game since being eliminated from the Stanley Cup Playoff contention. After Jakub Voracek had a near miss in the crease in the opening seconds, he took a stretch pass from Claude Giroux and beat Peters on a breakaway for his 20th goal of the season, the first time he has reached that milestone. All the Flyers needed, it turns out, was Simmonds. The last time the 24-year-old popped for three goals came in his final season of junior hockey with the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds. His first of the night came in the second period on a 2-on-1. Matt Read reached past Hurricanes defenseman Jamie McBain to slide a pass across the slot to Simmonds, who buried a short wrister. After Carolina's Justin Faulk tied the game at 2-2, Flyers forward Sean Couturier won a battle in the corner to set up Simmonds for a hard slap shot over Peters' blocker. Simmonds big night wasn't over. With the Flyers holding onto a 4-3 lead early in the third period, he set up Read for the final goal of the night. Read also added two assists. If there was any concern the Flyers would be flat in their first game after elimination from playoff contention, they erased it with a complete game. Recently acquired goaltender Steve Mason earned his second win for the Flyers. While he did not face many flurries around his net, he made a handful of big stops. He was especially sharp in the final two minutes, when the Hurricanes skated 6-on-4 after pulling the goaltender during a power play. While the Flyers (20-22-3) can't parlay the win into anything more than a confidence booster, they're glad to have something to build on. The fact that they had plenty of fans in tow on the road only makes it better.

Phoenix v Chicago 3-2 - Brent Seabrook scored twice on his 28th birthday, but David Schlemko and Mike Smith made sure the Chicago Blackhawks didn't blow out the candles on the Phoenix Coyotes' Stanley Cup Playoff hopes. The Coyotes outlasted Chicago 3-2 in a shootout Saturday at United Center that was decided by Schlemko's roofed shot in the third round of the breakaway competition. The effort was also backed by 36 saves from Smith, who started after missing the previous two games with a lower-body injury. Smith made a great stop in overtime to deny Seabrook a hat trick on his birthday, while Schlemko and Keith Yandle also came up with a pair of back-to-back blocks in that frenzied sequence to deny Blackhawks stars Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews of likely goals early in overtime. Rostislav Klesla and Radim Vrbata scored in regulation for the Coyotes (19-17-8), who head to the Motor City for a key game Monday against the Detroit Red Wings, one of the three teams between themselves and eighth place in the Western Conference. Chicago (34-5-5), which earned a point and hasn't lost in regulation in the month of April, is still contending for the Presidents' Trophy for most points in the NHL, something the Blackhawks haven't done since the 1990-91 season. The Pittsburgh Penguins (68 points) beat the Boston Bruins on Saturday, but still trail Chicago (73 points) with each team having four games left. The Blackhawks, however, are more concerned about keeping their level of intensity high in those final games heading into the postseason. They also wanted to fix their struggling power play and appear to be on the right track – scoring both of Seabrook's goals on the man-advantage and going 2-for-4 just one night after going 2-for-3 in a 5-4 OT win against the Nashville Predators. Prior to these last two games, Chicago hadn't scored a power-play goal in its previous 19 chances and slipped further down the NHL rankings in that special-teams area. Now the Blackhawks have it cranked up. It was the first time Crawford had faced Phoenix since the Coyotes ousted the Blackhawks in the first round of the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs, when some haunting overtime goals lingered into the offseason with him. Klesla's goal in this game briefly brought those memories. After lifting a dump-in toward the Chicago net, Klesla saw the puck hop off the ice right in front of Crawford and skip into the net to tie it 1-1 at 12:06 of the first. It was a big momentum boost for the Coyotes, who were outplayed in the game's first 10 minutes by a team that had played just 24 hours earlier. Smith didn't get a chance to ease into the game at all. Toews put a couple of shots on goal early and a rung one off the left post from the slot, while Smith made a dazzling pad save on a slap shot by Nick Leddy 3:47 into the first to keep it scoreless. Smith also made a great glove save against Brandon Saad later in the first Seabrook scored the game's first goal 11:20 into it off a slapper from the left circle that sailed through a nice screen to cap a power play. After Klesla tied it, Vrbata scored at 14:40 of the first to put Phoenix up 2-1, beating Crawford on the short side from the left circle. That's how it stayed until 3:39 of the second, when Seabrook capped another power play with his second goal of the night to tie it 2-2 and make the rest of the NHL raise a collective eyebrow. Chicago is suddenly scorching on the power play and Seabrook's second goal, his seventh of the season, was a beauty. After drawing the attention of all four Phoenix penalty killers toward the right circle, Kane zipped a perfect backhand pass to the low slot, where Seabrook drifted unchecked. He ripped a snap shot that beat Smith over the catching glove and that tilted momentum for the rest of the period. Neither team scored for rest of regulation and OT, despite some great chances, and it boiled down to Schlemko and Smith in the shootout.

Detroit v Vancouver 1-2 - Cory Schneider has backstopped the Vancouver Canucks into the Stanley Cup Playoffs. They might want to rely on him less once the postseason begins. Schneider made 21 of his 33 saves in the third period and overtime, then turned aside Pavel Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterberg and Damien Brunner in the shootout to lift the Canucks to a 2-1 win against the Detroit Red Wings on Saturday. Maxim Lapierre scored in the third round of the shootout, coming in really slow and making a handful of dekes before roofing a backhand high over the blocker of a sprawled Jimmy Howard. But the real story was Schneider, who then stuffed Brunner's five-hole attempt at the other end to secure the win, and a playoff berth for the Canucks. Alexander Edler scored the other goal on a power play as the Canucks, coming off a five-game road trip, won for just the second time in five games to move six points ahead of the Minnesota Wild atop the Northwest Division. The only thing the Red Wings need to improve is their finish. Detroit had a handful of great chances while outshooting Vancouver 17-2 in the third period. But the Wings couldn't beat Schneider, who dove across to rob Justin Abdelkader on a rebound, stopped Gustav Nyquist three times, one tip and two rebounds, on a power play and robbed Johan Franzen on a 2-on-1 in the final minute. Cory Emmerton scored the lone goal, and Howard made 13 saves before the shootout for the Red Wings, who are 1-2-3 as they attempt to extend their streak of playoff appearances to 22 seasons. Detroit did move into sole possession of ninth place in the Western Conference, one point ahead of the Dallas Stars, but is still one back of the Columbus Blue Jackets for the final playoff spot. Columbus only has three games remaining, while Detroit and Dallas each have four games left, including one against each other. Detroit scored 13 goals while winning the first two meetings with the Canucks this season, but only had 13 shots after two periods Saturday. The Wings more than made up for it over the final 25 minutes, but Datsyuk was the only one who could put a puck behind Schneider, and it rang off the crossbar. They will do so back in Detroit against the Phoenix Coyotes on Monday, three of their final four games are at home, but without fourth-line forward Drew Miller, who broke his right hand in the first period. Edler opened the scoring at the tail end of consecutive power plays that included a failed 5-on-3 for 47 seconds, one timing a shot from the left point that got through Howard's legs before he could get his pads sealed to the ice. The Red Wings tied it with 20.6 seconds left in the first when Brunner intercepted a clearing attempt around the boards and fired a quick shot from the edge of the right faceoff circle that Emmerton tipped under Schneider's glove. While neither was busy, Schneider and Howard both made tough saves early. Schneider threw out the left pad to rob Franzen on a rebound in tight eight minutes into the game, forced Daniel Cleary wide on a clear breakaway from the blue line in with seven minutes left in the first period, and got pieces of shots by Abdelkader and Nyqvist walking in untouched off the boards. The Canucks, who lost defenseman Keith Ballard to a back injury early in the third period, only had seven shots in the first half of the game, but they included a pair of Alexandre Burrows breakaways. Howard, whose two puck handling miscues led to goals in a tough 3-2 loss to the Calgary Flames on Wednesday, forced Burrows to lose the puck and tripped him up on a shorthanded dash late in the first period, and denied him with the left pad on a quick deke on another partial break midway through the second.