Kane gets 2nd hat trick in 3 games
Patrick Kane had his second hat trick in three games, Scott Darling made 36 saves and the Blackhawks beat Pittsburgh 4-1 in Chicago on Wednesday night for their fifth straight victory and 10th in 11 games.
Richard Panik also scored to help Chicago pull three points back of first-place Minnesota in the Central Division and Western Conference. Kane, last season’s MVP, has a team-leading 27 goals — scoring 12 times and adding seven assists in his past 11 games.
Scott Wilson scored for Pittsburgh. It was the first meeting this season between the last two Stanley Cup winners.
Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 25 shots for Pittsburgh in his first start in two weeks. Lightning 4, Hurricanes 3: Victor Hedman scored his second goal of the game 46 seconds into overtime, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves in Tampa Bay’s victory over visiting Carolina. Tyler Johnson and Nikita Kucherov also scored to help the Lightning improve to 7-1-2 in their past 10 games. Noah Hanifin, Derek Ryan and Jay McClement scored for Carolina, and Eddie Lack stopped 12 shots. Hedman lifted a shot over Lack during the extra session.
Trade deadline: Eighteen trades were completed before the Wednesday afternoon deadline, involving 33 players, but only 12 involved NHL players. The others were minorleaguers. The Avalanche traded forward Jarome Iginla to the Los Angeles Kings for a conditional fourth-round pick in 2018. The Detroit Red Wings traded forward Thomas Vanek to the Florida Panthers for defenseman Dylan McIlrath and a conditional third-round pick in June.