Lightning roll in Game 1 of Cup Final
Playoff scoring leader Nikita Kucherov had two goals and an assist and Andrei Vasilevskiy finished with 18 saves to outplay Carey Price and lead the Lightning to a 5-1 victory over the Canadiens in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on Monday night in Tampa, Florida.
Kucherov put the defending champs up 3-1 early in the third period with a fluky goal that Canadiens defenseman Ben Chiarot tried to bat down with his hand before it wound up in the net.
Kucherov scored again at 11:25 of the third, then assisted on Steven Stamkos’ power-play goal that made it 5-1 with just over a minute to go. The Canadiens hadn’t given up a power-play goal in an NHL playoff-record 13 consecutive games. Game 2 is Wednesday night in Tampa.
■ The Oilers signed F Ryan NugentHopkins, 28, to an eight-year contract extension Tuesday with an average annual value of $5.125 million. He had 16 goals and 19 assists in 52 games this season.
Colleges: Vanderbilt gave Jack Leiter a big early lead and went on to an 8-2 victory over Mississippi State in Game 1 of the College World Series finals Monday night in Omaha, Nebraska, to move within a win of a second straight national championship. The Commodores (49-16) scored seven runs off Christian MacLeod and Chase Patrick in the first inning. Leiter (11-4), the national strikeouts leader and a projected top-five pick in the MLB draft next month, allowed two runs and three hits and fanned eight in six innings. Nick Maldonado pitched three innings of shutout relief for his ninth save. Game 2 was Tuesday night but ended too late for this edition . ... Twenty-nine more men are suing Ohio State over its failure to stop sexual abuse decades ago by team doctor Richard Strauss, who died in 2005. More than 400 alumni have raised similar allegations in lawsuits against the university, alleging abuse throughout the doctor’s two decades at OSU. A law firm investigation conducted for Ohio State concluded employees were aware of concerns about Strauss as early as 1979 but didn’t stop him.
NFL: Owner Dan Snyder’s wife Tanya was named co-CEO of the Washington Football Team, giving her bigger influence in the club that is currently in the midst of an independent investigation into workplace conduct the league is overseeing. The team hired lawyer Beth Wilkinson last summer to look into allegations of sexual harassment and other improper conduct within the organization. The league took over that investigation . ... The league will not hold a supplemental draft for the second straight year, ESPN reported. The supplemental draft is available for players whose eligibility situations changed after the January declaration deadline for the regular draft. In 2019, the year of the most recent supplemental draft, the Cardinals made the only pick when they selected S Jalen Thompson in the fifth round.
Soccer: Raheem Sterling scored in the 75th minute and Harry Kane added another goal on a header in the 86th minute to lift England over Germany 2-0 and into the quarterfinals of the European Championship. England will face Ukraine on Saturday in Rome. Substitute Artem Dovbyk scored in stoppage time to lift Ukraine over previously-unbeaten Sweden 2-1.