Hall’s OT goal lifts Bruins

Taylor Hall scored off a rebound of David Pastrnak’s shot 1:41 into overtime, lifting the red-hot Boston Bruins to a 4-3 win over the Western Conference-leading Nashville Predators on Saturday in Boston.

Brad Marchand, Craig Smith and Mike Reilly also scored for the Bruins, who won their fifth straight and are 8-1 since New Year’s Day. Linus Ullmark made 26 saves.

“Looking back, with the COVID break, we had a little time where we could ramp back up,” Smith said. “If anybody was in a spot where they weren’t happy about their game, it was a spot where they could regroup.”

Colton Sissons, Luke Kunin and Ramon Josi each had a goal for Nashville, which has only lost three times in regulation in its past 18 games.

Panthers 9, Blue Jackets 2: Carter Verhaeghe and Anton Lundell each scored twice, MacKenzie Weegar tied a career-best with four points and NHL-co-leading Florida scored early and often against visiting Columbus. Aaron Ekblad had three assists for Florida. Weegar, Jonathan Huberdeau, Anthony Duclair, Sam Bennett and Patric Hornqvist all had goals for the Panthers, who improved the NHL’s best record to 26-7-5 and best home mark to 21-3-0.

Lightning 3, Stars 1: Host Tampa Bay kept pace with Florida as Ross Colton had the tie-breaking goal on a breakaway midway through the third, Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 19 shots, and the Lightning beat Dallas for the Stars’ seventh road loss in a row.

Maple Leafs 6, Blues 5: Ilya Mikheyev scored the go-ahead goal with 3:15 left, lifting visiting Toronto over the co-No. 2 team in the West. Timothy Liljegren, Mitch Marner, Auston Matthews, John Tavares and Michael Bunting also scored for Toronto. St. Louis lost in regulation at home for the first time since Nov. 16 — a stretch during which it was 12-0-1. Ryan O’Reilly scored twice and Niko Mikkola, Robert Thomas and Brandon Saad also scored for the Blues.

Rangers 3, Flyers 2: Chris Kreider scored with 6:30 left, fellow All-Star Adam Fox had two assists and Metropolitan Division-leading New York has won six of eight after winning in Philadelphia.

Capitals 2, Islanders 0: Tom Wilson scored early, Alex Ovechkin added an empty-net goal late, and Vitek Vanecek made 23 saves as visiting Washington snapped a four-game skid.

Hurricanes 4, Canucks 1: Martin Necas had a goal and an assist on his 23rd birthday and host Carolina, third in the East, stopped a two-game skid.

Red Wings 4, Sabres 0: Tyler Bertuzzi had a goal and two assists, Alex Nedeljkovic stopped 22 shots for his fourth career shutout and host Detroit ended a four-game losing streak.