Vegas wins battle of conference leaders
Fleury helps Golden Knights earn 2-game sweep of Lightning
Marc-Andre Fleurymade 28 saves, David Perron had a goal and an assist, and the Vegas Golden Knights beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-1 Thursday night in a matchup of conference leaders in Tampa, Fla.
James Neal , Nate Schmidt and William Karlsson also scored for the Golden Knights, who swept the two- game season series with the NHLleading Lightning.
Tampa Bay, coming off its bye week, got a goal from Ondrej Palat, and Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 26 shots. Vasilevskiy, an AllStar this season, has allowed 19 goals over his last four games.
Fleury made a number of impressive stops, including a left- circle shot by Steven Stamkos and in- close chance from Nikita Kucherov during the second period. The goalie, who spent most of career with Pittsburgh, is 19-11- 4 against the Lightning.
Vegas is 19-1- 0 when scoring first, with the lone loss coming Oct. 30 to the New York Islanders.
PENGUINS 3, KINGS 1 » Patric Hornqvist scored two goals and Evgeni Malkin got the tiebreaking goal early in the third period of Pittsburgh’s victory in Los Angeles, its fifth win in six games. Casey DeSmith stopped 28 shots to earn his first NHL victory in his third career appearance for Pittsburgh. Malkin had a goal and an assist as the Penguins bounced back from a loss in Anaheim one night earlier with a solid effort at Staples Center in the second stop of the back-toback Stanley Cup champions’ three-game California trip. Midway through the third, Dustin Brown got a game misconduct penalty for sending a kneeling Justin Schultz into the boards near the Kings’ bench. Schultz stayed down for a longmoment before skating off gingerly.
BRUINS5, ISLANDERS2 » Patrice Bergeron scored three goals to lead visiting Boston to another victory, giving the Bruins at least a point for the 15th consecutive game. Brad Marchand had a goal and two assists as Boston improved to 110- 4 since its last regulation loss Dec. 14 against Washington — its best stretch since going 15- 0-1 from March 2-30, 2014. FLYERS 3, MAPLE LEAFS 2 (OT) » Sean Couturier scored 18 seconds into over- time, and host Philadelphia rallied for the win. Couturier took a feed fromTravis Konecny and beat Frederik Anderson with a wrist shot to give the Flyers their fifth win in six games. Nolan Patrick and Wayne Simmonds scored early in the third period for the Flyers. MichalNeuvirth stopped 29 shots, including a sprawling pad save on PatrickMarleau with 2:48 left in regulation. PREDATORS 3, COYOTES 2 (SO) » Craig Smith scored the deciding goal in the shootout to give host Nashville its fourth consecutive win. In the fourth round of the shootout, Smith was able to beat Arizona’s Antti Raanta with a quick wrist shot low to the glove side. DEVILS 4, CAPITALS 3 (OT)
» Taylor Hall scored on a breakaway 34 seconds into overtime, lifting New Jersey to a win inNewark, N. J. Sami Vatanen collected his third assist of the game on the winning goal, a shot over the shoulder of goaltender Braden Holtby. BLUEJACKETS2, STARS1 (SO) » Artemi Panarin scored in the second round of a shootout, sending host Columbus to the win. Joonas Korpisalo had 35 saves for Columbus, which returned fromits five-day break after losing both ends of a backto-back last week. BLUES4, SENATORS1 » Vladimir Tarasenko, Alex Pietrangelo and Brayden Schenn scored in the second period, helping the Blues to the road win. Alexander Steen added an empty netter at 18:42, and Carter Hutton made 20 saves. RANGERS4, SABRES3 » Pavel Buchnevich scored the goahead goal late in the third period, leading New York to the home victory. RickNash scored twice for the second straight game and Henrik Lundqvist made 34 saves for New York. FLYERSRETIRELINDROS’NO. 88 » Nearly 17 years after a bitter breakup, the Flyers retired Eric Lindros’ jersey on Thursday night in Philadelphia in a stirring tribute to the Hall of Fame center. No. 88 was raised to the rafters of Wells Fargo Center, a facility Lindros helped open in 1996, before the Flyers played his hometown Toronto Maple Leafs. “Very blessed that I could’ve played in Philadelphia,” Lindros said as the crowd roared. Combining size, skill and strength, the 6-foot- 4 Lindros averaged a franchise record 1.35 points per game in Philadelphia from 1992-2000. Lindros won the Hart Trophy as league MVP in 1995. He helped the Flyers to the Stanley Cup Final two years later, where they were swept by Detroit.