Calgary Flames @ Nashville Predators 2-1 OT
Kris Russell scored 1:23 into overtime to give the Calgary Flames a 2-1 win against the Nashville Predators at Bridgestone Arena. Johnny Gaudreau led a 2-on-1 rush and fed a pass to Russell, who was able to get to the puck and beat Predators goaltender Pekka Rinne for his second goal. The Flames have won six in a row and are a League-best 8-1 in games decided during 3-on-3 overtime. Russell said there's a method and confidence Calgary has that has led to the Flames' success in overtime. The Predators are 1-2-1 in their past four games and 9-4-2 at home. Cody Hodgson gave the Predators a 1-0 lead at 5:09 of the first period when he scored on a penalty shot. Hodgson was hooked by Flames defenseman T.J Brodie on a breakaway and was awarded the penalty shot. He made a quick move to freeze Ramo and then beat him with a wrist shot on the glove side for his third goal. Brodie tied the game 1-1 at 12:28 of the second period. Nashville lost Brodie in coverage, and he took a pass from Sam Bennett and fired a wrist shot past Rinne for his fourth goal. Calgary had two minutes of a 5-on-3 power play in the second period but was unable to convert. Ramo made 21 saves, including 11 in the first period when Nashville controlled the play. At one point in the period, Nashville was outshooting Calgary 12-1. Rinne finished with 19 saves. Michael Frolik left the game early in the third period with an upper-body injury and didn't return. Hartley said after the game that Frolik was being evaluated but that the injury "didn't look good." The Flames visit the Dallas Stars on Thursday in the second of a four-game road trip. The Predators play at the St. Louis Blues on Thursday.
Shea Weber: "It was good to get that first goal. I think we needed to get that second one. I thought we had a lot more chances in the first."
Peter Laviolette: "I think they responded and upped their game. They had been playing well, from what we had scouted anyway, better than they were playing in the first period. I still think that we could have been better in the second. We ran into some penalty issues there, had to get through that. I thought the penalty kill did a good job and sometimes you can grab momentum from that, but we weren't able to seem to grab any."
Vancouver Canucks @ Minnesota Wild 2-6
After playing close games during a three-game road trip, the Minnesota Wild returned home and scored four times in the second period of a 6-2 win against the Vancouver Canucks at Xcel Energy Center. Thomas Vanek and Mikko Koivu each had a goal and three assists for Minnesota. Koivu made it 4-1 at 8:12 of the second period with his 150th NHL goal. Parise had a goal, two assists and a Wild-high eight shots on goal. His assist on Ryan Suter's power-play goal at 12:36 of the second was his 300th in the NHL. Wild goaltender Darcy Kuemper, in his fourth consecutive start in place of injured Devan Dubnyk, made 29 saves for his third win. The Wild scored 10 goals in its previous six games but managed to go 4-0-2 because of solid goaltending and improved play by their defensemen. In a 2-0 win against the San Jose Sharks on Saturday, Yeo shuffled the lines during the third period. Their forward chemistry showed signs of life, so he stuck with those groups. Minnesota has at least one point in eight consecutive games (5-0-3) since a 3-1 loss to the Winnipeg Jets on Nov. 27. The Wild play five of their next six games here, where they are 11-3-1 this season. Vancouver started its six-game road trip 0-2-0 with four games remaining against Eastern Conference opponents. The Canucks have lost five straight games on the road since a 3-2 win here on Nov. 25. Miller allowed six goals on 36 shots before he was replaced by Jacob Markstrom to start the third period. Miller did stop a number of odd-man opportunities and Grade A chances.
Vanek and Jason Zucker scored first-period goals to give the Wild a 2-0 lead. Vanek's was the first of three power-play goals; he capped a tic-tac-toe passing play from Jason Pominville along the half-wall to Parise in the slot, who dropped it to Vanek in front of Miller. Parise had three shots at the net early in the second, finally scoring on the third try from one knee. On a power play, Parise gained control of the puck near the right post but saw Miller shut down each of his first two tries. His third somehow got through from a bad angle for his 10th at 5:25. Jannik Hansen scored off a turnover to get the Canucks within 3-1 at 6:45, but Koivu, Suter and Scandella scored less than eight minutes apart to make it 6-1. Daniel Sedin scored for Vancouver at 6:16 of the third; Henrik Sedin had two assists. Koivu has played 710 NHL games; Parise has played 712.
Mike Yeo: "The talk in San Jose [on Saturday] was, I thought we were going to break out that night. I knew that if we kept playing the same way, offensively, things would start clicking a little more. Our play without the puck has been better. Because of that, we've had the puck a lot more. You could see the execution, getting our [defensemen] involved, a little more zone time. We've had the puck more and obviously that creates more opportunities to score goals and creates more counterattack opportunities. We knew if we could stick with it and maybe get a little bit hungrier around the net that we could break loose."
Thomas Vanek: "Tonight was just one of those nights where we clicked and the puck went in the net. It comes with confidence. The last five or six games, we've been playing good hockey. We weren't scoring as many goals, but I thought we created a lot more. Tonight, we got rewarded."
Colorado Avalanche @ Chicago Blackhawks 3-0
Patrick Kane's point streak ended at 26 games, and Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov made 29 saves in a 3-0 win against the Blackhawks at United Center.
Kane played 23:11, had no shots on goal and his three attempts were blocked. The Blackhawks went 15-7-4 during his streak, which is the longest by an American-born player and longest in Blackhawks history. Kane on Sunday passed Sidney Crosby of the Pittsburgh Penguins for the longest streak by an active NHL player; he fell short of the 30-game streak by Mats Sundin of the Quebec Nordiques in 1992-93. Varlamov is 8-0-0 with a 1.19 goals-against average and .968 save percentage against the Blackhawks since 2013-14, and 11-3-0 with three shutouts in 15 career appearances against them. Zach Redmond scored early in the second period for the Avalanche, and Gabriel Landeskog had an empty-net goal and an assist. The Avalanche are 7-2-0 against Central Division opponents and swept a three-game road trip against divisional foes. They are 11-9-0 on the road and won for the fifth time in their past six games away from Pepsi Center. Coming into the game, the Avalanche were determined to play better defensively after allowing 43 shots on goal in a 3-1 win at the St. Louis Blues on Sunday. Corey Crawford made 24 saves for Chicago, which had won its past two games and four of five. Crawford, who had shutouts in his previous two games, is 4-9-2 in 15 appearances against Colorado with a 3.02 GAA and .883 save percentage. The Avalanche's puck-possession game was a bigger source of concern for the Blackhawks, who had a difficult time getting through the neutral zone most of the game. Duchene's shot from the left circle hit a stick and deflected over Crawford's shoulder into the net, ending the Chicago goalie's shutout streak at 155:16. Landeskog and Nathan MacKinnon assisted. A lineup decision by Avalanche coach Patrick Roy resulted in the game's second goal. Redmond, who was scratched the previous six games, made it 2-0 at 1:43 of the second when he scored his first goal in 25 games, dating to March 8. Chicago outshot Colorado 13-9 in the second, but Varlamov made saves on quality scoring chances by Bryan Bickell and Teuvo Teravainen to preserve the Avalanche's lead. Kane had 16 goals and 24 assists during his streak, which began with an empty-net goal Oct. 17 against the Columbus Blue Jackets, Chicago's sixth game of the season. He has scored a point in 29 of 32 games. Kane kept the streak alive with an empty-net assist in Game 22, an empty-net goal in Game 23, and a third-period goal in Game 24.
Wayne Gretzky holds the NHL record with a 51-game streak for the Edmonton Oilers that started the 1983-84 season. There are 10 streaks of at least 28 games in NHL history. Matt Duchene 16th goal opened the scoring at 14:30 of the first period.
Patrick Kane: "It was a good run," Kane said. "[I] didn't have it tonight, so you know, I can just focus on playing hockey, and it'll be nice not to talk about it anymore. When you have to talk about it every day, it gets a little taxing, but I'm excited just to play hockey now."
Duncan Keith: "It wasn't our best game. They have a good skating team, a good team. It was a big two points on the line, and that's what we're disappointed about. It was a [Central Division] game. We need to be better and regroup now."
Joel Quenneville: "Amazing streak. I commend him on the consistency and the preparation. The fact that he was able to sustain it for this length of time was amazing."
Matt Duchene: "I don't think we thought about [ending] it until the end. When he was on the ice there at the end, we were kind of like, 'OK, it'd be a nice little feather in our cap to end it.' Our biggest goal was to win tonight. [Varlamov] was outstanding, and we got some big games from some guys, so it was great."
Semyon Varlamov: "My secret? I don't have any secrets. It's all about my teammates. They play well in front of me every time we're here in Chicago. No secrets. I like to play here in this building, and [this] was a big game for us."
Gabriel Landeskog: "I think we all felt after the St. Louis game that wasn't good enough and we knew that we stole that one. Anytime you get outshot like that and a team dominates you like that, you definitely have a feel of urgency and you want to bounce back."
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