Flames get well against Blueshirts

escaped the face-off circle with possession of the puck and made his move to Although the playoffs seem out of reach, the net. He craftily slid the puck from his the Devils are not going to waste the rest backhand to forehand to give the Devils a of the season. 2-1 lead.

Nico Hischier scored the tiebreaking “I saw a lane there, so I took hit,” goal early in the third period, Hischier said of his mindset and the Devils beat the on the goal. Islanders, 2-1, Thursday Brock Nelson scored for night at Nassau Coliseum the Islanders and Semyon for their third straight win. Varlamov made 29 saves as

“We are playing with the Isles lost their fourth confidence and we are making straight at Nassau Coliseum. plays,” Hischier said. “From one guy to “We got away from our game of making the last guy, everybody digs in.” it really hard on them,” Islanders

P.K. Subban also scored and Mackenzie coach Barry Trotz said. “I thought we Blackwood added 29 saves to help the were doing a pretty good job for the first Devils improve to 6-2-1 in their last nine 30 minutes. We got to stay to what we do games. well. If there is a play to be made, make it.

Hischier extended his point streak to If it’s not, then let’s put it in a place where four games when he scored the go-ahead we can retrieve it or continue to possess goal at 1:09 of the third. The Swiss forward it. I didn’t think we did that right through the whole game.”

Nelson gave the Islanders a 1-0 lead when he put a wrist shot past Blackwood 7:33 into the second. Nelson charged up ice during 4-on-4 play and stopped short upon entering the offensive zone. A Devil defender momentarily screened Blackwood and Nelson took advantage of the opportunity. Ryan Pulock and Derick Brassard assisted on the opening goal.

Anders Lee had a chance to double the Islanders’ advantage after 19-yearold defenseman Noah Dobson delivered a cross-ice pass, but Blackwood made a sliding pad save.

T`hose are the saves that you need in order to win some games,” Devils coach Alain Nasreddine said. “It certainly keeps the game tighter. Those saves are big and that’s what you need from your goaltender and right now we are getting it from Blackwood.”

CALGARY — Johnny Gaudreau opened the scoring and then set up the winning goal midway through the second period as the Flames snapped a five-game losing streak at home with a 4-3 victory over the Rangers on Thursday night.

Less than three minutes after the Rangers tied it, 3-3, Sean Monahan gave the Flames their third lead at 8:22 of the second when he neatly finished off a tic-tac-toe passing sequence.

Gaudreau fed a pass back to Noah Hanifin at the blue line and he immediately zipped a pass in front to Monahan, who used his quick hands to score his 14th of the season.

Mikael Backlund and Derek Ryan also scored for Calgary (21-17-5), which picked up a shorthanded goal while the Rangers were on a 5-on-3 advantage. Cam Talbot stopped 24 shots to beat his former team. Jacob Trouba, Filip Chytil and rookie Kaapo Kaako scored for the Rangers (19-17-4). Rangers defenseman Adam Fox, a Flames draft pick, collected three assists.

The Rangers fell to 1-2-0 on a four-game road trip that wraps up Saturday night in Vancouver.

After getting off to shaky starts, Talbot and Henrik Lundqvist were perfect over the final half of the game. Talbot began his NHL career as Lundqvist’s backup for two seasons.

Beaten on two of the first three shots he faced, Talbot settled in and improved to 4-7-0.

Lundqvist, who gave up three goals on his first nine shots, ended up turning aside 25. His record fell to 9-9-3.

Down 3-2 after the first period, the Rangers tied it at 5:46 of the second on Kakko’s long-range shot through a maze of bodies in front.

Coming off consecutive home games in which they fell behind 3-0 in the first period, it was Calgary that got the jump on this night with Gaudreau first to a loose puck in the neutral zone and scoring on a breakaway at 6:48.

The Flames then scored the rare shorthanded goal while playing two men down when Backlund intercepted Tony DeAngelo’s cross-ice pass and headed up ice on a breakaway. Backlund beat Lundqvist on a move to his backhand for his sixth goal of the season.