Penguins net 4 unanswered goals to snap Islanders’ streak, Avalanche end slide
>> NEW YORK: Bryan Rust scored his second goal of the game with 1:35 minutes left in overtime on Thursday night to cap a furious comeback by the visiting Pittsburgh Penguins, who scored four unanswered goals in the third period and overtime to snap the New York Islanders’ 10-game winning streak with a 4-3 win.
Rust stole the puck from Brock Nelson behind the net and tucked a wraparound shot past Islanders goalie Semyon Varlamov to cap the comeback by the Penguins, who snapped a two-game losing streak.
Jared McCann, Rust and Evgeni Malkin scored in the first nine minutes of the third period for the Penguins. Goalie Matt Murray overcame a slow start to make 20 saves.
Casey Cizikas, Cal Clutterbuck and Adam Pelech scored for the Islanders, whose winning streak was the second-longest in franchise history behind a 15-game run during the 1981-82 season. Varlamov made 35 saves.
Joonas Donskoi had three goals for his first career hat-trick, Nathan MacKinnon had a goal and three assists, and hosts Colorado used a six-goal second period to beat Nashville 9-4 in Denver.
The six goals came in a span of eight minutes as Colorado went from down 3-2 five minutes into the second period to up 8-3 with 6:34 minutes left in the frame. The win snapped a five-game losing streak for the Avalanche.
Ryan Graves, Cale Makar and Andre Burakovsky had a goal and two assists each, Matt Nieto and Matt Calvert also had goals, and Erik Johnson added two assists to help Colorado end an eight-game home losing streak to Nashville.
John Tavares scored at 2:33 minutes of overtime to complete hosts Toronto’s 2-1 comeback against Vegas.
Tavares, who also had an assist in the game, took a pass from Mitch Marner and fired a shot from the right circle for his fourth goal of the season. Auston Matthews also scored for the Maple Leafs, tying the game in the third period.
Max Pacioretty broke a scoreless tie 4:08 minutes into the third for the Golden Knights, his fourth tally of the season. The teams combined for one goal on 11 power plays, Matthews’ tying score at 8:14 minutes of the third.