Buffalo's Chris Drury scored on a rebound in overtime and Martin Biron became the first NHL goalie in eight years to win 12 consecutive starts, helping the Sabres ruin Michel Therrien's debut as the Pittsburgh Penguins' coach with a 4-3 victory on Friday.
Drury and Ales Kotalik each had a power-play goal and two assists as the Sabres won their fifth in a row and 13th in 15 games despite allowing Ziggy Palffy's tying goal with 2:17 left in regulation.
Biron stopped 24 shots. The Sabres' eight consecutive road wins are two short of the club record 10 in 1983-1984 that set an NHL record and has been matched twice. Biron's streak is the NHL's longest since New Jersey's Martin Brodeur won 12 in a row in 1997-1998.
PHOTO: AP
Even with a new coach and a new defense-first system in place, the Penguins lost their ninth in 10 games and their 24th in 32 games, counting overtime.
Blackhawks 5, Blues 1
At Chicago, Mark Bell, Martin Lapointe and Andy Hilbert each had a goal and an assist, and Nikolai Khabibulin stopped 32 shots to lead Chicago over St. Louis.
Jim Dowd added a goal, and Pavel Vorobiev scored into an empty net with 1:37 left.
Among Khabibulin's saves was a blocker deflection of Doug Weight's penalty shot at 8:22 of the second period.
Dean McAmmond scored for the Blues, who have won just one of their last five games and two of nine.
St. Louis forward Keith Tkachuk left the game with a hand injury after skating two shifts in the second period and didn't return. Tkachuk's five-game goal streak and seven-game point run were snapped.
Sharks 4, Capitals 1
At San Jose, California, Joe Thornton had a goal and an assist in his sixth straight multipoint performance, and San Jose remained unbeaten in six games since his arrival.
Jonathan Cheechoo, Alyn McCauley and rookie Milan Michalek also scored for the Sharks, who returned from five days off with the same flair and passion they've shown ever since Thornton was acquired from Boston on Nov. 30.
Thornton set up Cheechoo's team-leading 13th goal and then scored one of his own in the first period, and the Sharks weathered Washington's strong third period to finish their ninth consecutive victory over the Capitals.
Thornton has 14 points in his six games in teal -- and so does Patrick Marleau, who also extended his scoring streak to six games.
Evgeni Nabokov stopped 25 shots to remain unbeaten in seven meetings with the Capitals. He lost his bid for his first shutout of the season on Ben Clymer's deflection goal with 12:12 to play.
Kings 4, Mighty Ducks 3, SO
At Anaheim, California, Petr Kanko scored the tying goal in his NHL debut and Los Angeles beat Anaheim in a shootout.
Derek Armstrong and Dustin Brown scored power-play goals in the first period for the Kings.
Pavol Demitra and Alexander Frolov scored the only goals in the shootout. Mathieu Garon made 42 saves and stopped Teemu Selanne and Scott Niedermayer in the NHL's new tiebreaker -- the first between the Southern California rivals
Joffrey Lupul had a goal and an assist for the Ducks, who also got goals from Todd Marchant and Petr Sykora. Jean-Sebastien Giguere stopped 34 shots, including a breakaway by Demitra with 33 seconds left in the third period.
Kanko was recalled from Manchester of the AHL on Friday and was inserted into the lineup in place of Luc Robitaille, who was benched.
With Olympic teams set to announce their rosters next week, the past few days have been filled with more talk about who won't be going to Turin than who will make the trip.
Canada lost two veteran leaders when Detroit captain Steve Yzerman and Pittsburgh owner-captain Mario Lemieux announced they were withdrawing from consideration.
The 40-year-old stars, who played on Canada's 2002 gold-medal Olympic team, have been bothered by injuries this season and decided to step aside for younger players. That has Sidney Crosby and Jason Spezza in the running to make the team.
Team Canada executive director Wayne Gretzky also has to decide whether to add Todd Bertuzzi, who is three months into his comeback from a 17-month suspension for his blindside punch to the head of Colorado's Steve Moore.
Through 31 games, the rugged Vancouver right wing had nine goals and 18 assists.
"That's probably the last thing on my mind. It's not something I have even thought about," Bertuzzi said. "If I get picked, obviously I'll be extremely excited and happy, but if not then I'll just continue to move on."
Bertuzzi said he doesn't need to be included on the team to feel like he's back in ice hockey's warm embrace.
"I feel accepted already," he said. "I've played against the majority of teams already and I've spoken to a lot of the guys. It's a dead issue with everyone."
Another notable withdrawal this week was Columbus forward Sergei Fedorov, who took himself out of the running for Russia's team because of a groin injury that has troubled him this season.
Team USA also has decisions to make before announcing its roster tomorrow.
One player who appears to be on the brink is Boston defenseman Brian Leetch, a three-time Olympian. The 37-year-old veteran of 18 NHL seasons had four goals and 10 assists in his first 22 games this season. Leetch missed 10 contests after spraining a knee in the Bruins' 14th game.
Tampa Bay goalie John Grahame has entered the American mix. Ty Conklin, who was invited to USA Hockey's Olympic orientation camp in September, has been limited by injury to six games this season with Edmonton and isn't expected to be picked.
Grahame wasn't at the camp, but his 14 wins and 2.73 goals-against average put him in competition with Philadelphia's Robert Esche and Buffalo's Ryan Miller for the two spots behind New York Islanders netminder Rick DiPietro.
Miller has played only 10 games because of a broken thumb and began an AHL rehab assignment last week.
Esche has battled injuries and inconsistent play this season and likely has lost the No. 1 status he held in last year's World Cup to DiPietro.
The 24-year-old Islanders goalie was 11-10-2 with a 3.15 GAA in his first 25 games this season.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier