Rangers rally to beat Penguins, stave off elimination
Filip Chytil scored the tiebreaking goal early in the third period and the New York Rangers staved off elimination with a 5-3 victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 5 of their firstround playoff series Wednesday night.
Jacob Trouba and Alexis Lafrenière each had a goal and an assist, and Adam Fox and Ryan Lindgren also scored for the Rangers. Igor Shesterkin, torched for 10 goals over three periods in the previous two games, made 27 saves.
Jake Guentzel had two goals and Kris Letang also scored for Pittsburgh, which leads the best-of-7 series 3-2. Evgeni Malkin had two assists and Louis Domingue finished with 29 saves.
Penguins star Sidney Crosby left with about seven minutes remaining in the second period with an apparent injury and didn't return.
Game 6 is Friday in Pittsburgh, and a potential deciding Game 7 would be Sunday back at Madison Square Garden.
The Rangers, who rallied from a 2-0 deficit, got their first power play of the night early in the third period and took advantage as Chytil got a pass from Lafrenière in the right circle, turned around and whipped a shot past Domingue to put the Rangers ahead 4-3 at 2:53.
Pittsburgh pulled Domingue for an extra skater with about 1 1/2 minutes remaining. He returned briefly 20 seconds later during a stoppage in play and left the ice again. Lindgren sealed the win with an empty-netter with 16 seconds left.
PANTHERS 5, CAPITALS 3 >>
Carter Verhaeghe set a franchise postseason record with a five-point night, and Florida escaped a three-goal deficit to beat Washington and take a 3-2 series lead.
Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 28 shots for Florida, which trailed 3-0 in the second period. Verhaeghe had two goals and three assists for the Panthers.
Patric Hornqvist, Claude Giroux and Sam Reinhart also scored for the Panthers, and Aleksander Barkov had two assists.
T.J. Oshie scored twice for Washington, which also got a goal from Justin Schultz and two assists from Evgeny Kuznetsov. Ilya Samsonov stopped 33 shots.
Verhaeghe broke the Panthers' playoff scoring record that Ray Sheppard set on a four-point night back on April 22, 1996 — which remains the last, and only, season in which the Panthers won a playoff series.
They can change that Friday, when Game 6 is played in Washington. Game 7, if necessary, would be back at Florida on Sunday.
This was the season of the comeback for Florida, which had an NHL-best 29 comefrom-behind wins during the regular season. The Panthers pulled off five wins after trailing by three goals, and rallied in the final moments of Game 4 to force overtime in Washington before winning early in the extra session and tying the series. NOTES >> Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse will miss today's Game 6 of Edmonton's series with Los Angeles after the NHL suspended him one game for head-butting Kings forward Phillip Danault. The suspension leaves the Oilers without their top defenseman heading into an elimination game in Los Angeles. The Kings lead the best-of-7 series 3-2 . ... The NHL also fined Oilers forward Zack Kassian $5,000 for cross-checking Kings defenseman Sean Durzi.