Meier’s two goals help lead Sharks to win in Jersey
Sharks leading scorer Timo Meier scored twice, James Reimer made 32 saves and San Jose defeated the New Jersey Devils 5-2 on Tuesday night in Newark.
Noah Gregor, Jacob Middleton and Erik Karlsson also scored for the Sharks, who have started their five-game road trip at 2-0.
Gregor opened the scoring at 4:26 of the first, beating Blackwood for his first goal of the season. Radim Simek and Marc-Edouard Vlasic assisted.
Middleton made it 2-0 at 4:14 of the second period with his second goal this season, with assists going to Gregor and Alexander Barabanov. It was Middleton’s second goal in 30 NHL games. The rugged defenseman has spent most of his playing career with the Sharks’ AHL affiliate in San Jose, the Barracuda.
“Another big road win for our team,” Middleton said. ”Especially after the start of the game we had in Chicago (the first win on the road), we were looking to come out all cylinders firing. I think we did that in the first and we had an even better second.”
Meier poured it on to make it 3-0 midway through the second on the power play, and Karlsson followed not long after to make it 4-0 San Jose.
“It was a good game for us,” Sharks coach Bob Boughner said. ”I thought that we got some contributions throughout the lineup, which was nice tonight, and some big goals, timely goals.”
Blues 4, Lightning 3: Ryan O’Reilly scored the lone goal in a shootout and goalie Jordan Binnington rebounded from a rough start to lift St. Louis to a comeback win over Tampa Bay at home. The Blues erased an early three-goal deficit and have won their last five against the Lightning.
Stars 4, Hurricanes 1: Roope Hintz scored his first career hat trick on an empty netter in the closing minutes and host Dallas beat Carolina for its fifth straight win.
Wild 5, Coyotes 2: Jordan Greenway had a goal and two assists, Kirill Kaprizov scored and Kaapo Kahkonen made 29 saves as Minnesota beat visiting Arizona. Joel Eriksson Ek, Jonas Brodin and Marcus Foligno also scored for Minnesota, which leads the NHL with 59 goals scored since Nov. 2.
Predators 6, Blue Jackets 0: Filip Forsberg scored four goals and Juuse Saros made 27 saves for his first shutout of the season, leading Nashville to a victory over Columbus on home ice.
Red Wings 2, Bruins 1: Marc Staal’s first goal of the season was the tiebreaker with just over eight minutes remaining in the third period, and Alex Nedeljkovic made 41 saves, leading visiting Detroit to its 3,000th NHL victory.
Panthers 5, Capitals 4: Sam Reinhart scored the winning power-play goal with 14.4 seconds left, capping a huge comeback for host Florida. Trailing 4-1, the Panthers scored four goals on a season-high 26 shots in the third period to snap a two-game skid.
Lemieux suspended: Kings forward Brendan Lemieux has been suspended for five games for biting Ottawa’s Brady Tkachuk last weekend. The bite happened late in the third period of the Kings’ 4-2 win last Saturday at Staples Center. Lemieux was prone on the ice and wrestling with Tkachuk and a linesman when he bit Tkachuk on the right hand.