BRUINS PREVAIL, CLINCH HOME ICE IN EAST PLAYOFFS
boston The Bruins own the NHL’s best home record.
Now they know they’ll have home-ice advantage throughout the Eastern Conference playoffs.
Johnny Boychuk scored the tiebreaking goal with 6:06 left in the third period, Milan Lucic had two goals, and the Bruins clinched the conference’s best record with a 5-2 win over the Flyers on Saturday afternoon.
With four games remaining on their schedule, the Bruins have 50 regulation and overtime wins — the league’s first tiebreaker. Second-place Pittsburgh has 44 and can’t catch Boston if it wins the rest of its games.
“You work so hard for that all season; it’s nice we could do it here,” Lucic said.
The win also moved Boston two points ahead of St. Louis for the NHL’s best record. The Blues lost to the Avs on Saturday. Robin Lehner made 41 saves and held off a furious late push by NewYork to lift the Senators to a 3-2 victory that prevented the
from clinching a playoff berth. … Tobias Enstrom scored the tiebreaking goal late in the second period, and the Jets beat the Maple Leafs 4-2. The Leafs have just three games remaining and trail Columbus by one point for the Eastern Conference’s last playoff spot. The Blue Jackets have five games left. … Brian Gionta scored his second goal of the game late in the third period to give the surging Canadiens a 5-3 victory over the RedWings. … Evgeny Kuznetsov scored in regulation and had the only goal in the shootout to lift the Capitals to a 4-3 win over the Islanders and keep their playoff hopes alive. Capitals goaltender Braden Holtby stopped all three Islanders attempts in the shootout, and Washington snapped a five-game losing streak to move within two points of Columbus for the final Eastern Conference playoff spot. … Dainus Zubrus scored two goals, and the Devils beat the Hurricanes 3-1. … Jamie Benn had two goals and an assist to lead the Stars in a 5-2 victory over the Lightning. … Cody McCormick had a goal and an assist, and Ilya Bryzgalov stopped all 20 shots he faced as the Wild beat the Penguins 4-0. Erik Haula, Mikko Koivu and Stephane Veilleux also scored for theWild, which maintained a five-point cushion over Dallas for the seventh playoff spot in theWestern Conference.