Chris Higgins scored the go-ahead goal and David Aebischer made 44 saves to help the Montreal Canadiens match their longest winning streak in more than 13 years with a 5-3 victory over the Ottawa Senators on Thursday.
Mike Ribeiro had three points, including his 15th goal, and Alex Kovalev had three assists. Mathieu Dandenault, Saku Koivu and Jan Bulis also scored for Montreal, which extended its winning streak to eight games and tied New Jersey for sixth in the Eastern Conference with 89 points.
The Canadiens, who play four of their last six games at home, have their longest win streak since an eight-gamer from Oct. 24 to Nov. 11, 1992.
PHOTO: AP
Ottawa's Dany Heatley scored twice, setting new team records with 47 goals and 95 points. Andrej Meszaros also scored for the Eastern Conference-leading Senators, who remain two games ahead of Carolina. Both teams also have six games remaining.
Rangers 3, Islanders 1
At New York, Jarkko Immonen scored his first NHL goal in the opening minute of the second period and Martin Straka scored twice, giving him seven in five games, to help the Rangers stretch their Atlantic Division lead.
The Rangers, 5-1-1 this season against the Islanders, lead Philadelphia by five points with six games left. Philadelphia has seven to play.
The 23-year-old Immonen was recalled to make his NHL debut earlier Thursday, replacing injured center Steve Rucchin, and got the Rangers even 21 seconds into the period. Straka made it 2-1 with 47.6 seconds left.
Originally, Jaromir Jagr -- the NHL leader in goals and points -- was announced as the scorer, which would have given him a team-record 53rd of the season. But when the buzzer sounded to end the period moments later, Jagr skated over to the referee to apparently tell him that he never touched the puck.
Straka was credited with the goal.
Bruins 3, Maple Leafs 2, SO
At Boston, Brad Boyes scored the only goal in the shootout to lift Boston to a victory over Toronto.
Mats Sundin salvaged a point for the Maple Leafs when he tied the game with 13 seconds left. Toronto is seven points behind Tampa Bay for the final playoff spot in the East.
Boston won for just the second time in 10 shootouts and improved to 5-11-3 in the last 19.
Sundin, Darcy Tucker and Alexei Ponikarovsky all were stopped by Bruins goalie Tim Thomas in the shootout.
Predators 3, Blues 0
At St. Louis, rookie Shea Weber scored his first goal and Paul Kariya had his 28th, helping Nashville hand St. Louis its franchise-record 12 straight loss.
The Blues were shutout for the fifth time this season.
Nashville won for just the second time in eight games with the wins coming against the Blues. The Predators are 7-0 against the Blues this season with one game remaining between the Central Division foes.
Nashville goalie Chris Mason recorded his first shutout of the season and second of his career. Mason turned aside 18 shots.
Kimon Timonen also scored for the Predators, who got all their scoring on the power play.
Lightning 3, Thrashers 2, SO
At Tampa, Florida, Vincent Lecavalier and Brad Richards scored shootout goals and Tampa Bay tightened its grip on the final playoff position in the Eastern Conference.
The defending Stanley Cup champions remain in eighth place in the East with 87 points -- six more than ninth-place Atlanta. Each team has six games remaining.
Burke, in his second start since returning from sitting out two weeks with a broken finger, stopped 29 shots in regulation and overtime, then rejected two of three shots by the Thrashers in the shootout.
Atlanta's Ilya Kovalchuk forced overtime by scoring his 50th goal of the season with just 4.3 seconds remaining in overtime. He also had as assist on Slava Kozlov's power-play goal in the second period.
Ryan Craig and Martin St. Louis scored for Tampa Bay.
Wild 2, Oilers 1, SO
At St. Paul, Minnesota, Brian Rolston beat old teammate Dwayne Roloson with a stick-side wrist shot to lift Minnesota.
Edmonton's Sergei Samsonov and Minnesota's Mikko Koivu each scored on their team's first shootout chance, but Ales Hemsky and Marian Gaborik were denied.
Ryan Smyth, who got the Oilers' goal in regulation, lost control of the puck on his try and was stopped by the Wild's Manny Fernandez -- setting up Rolston's opportunity to win.
That capped a night of superb goaltending by Roloson and Fernandez, who shared the job in Minnesota for four seasons until Roloson was traded to Edmonton last month. Fernandez made 32 saves, and Roloson had 26.
Stephane Veilleux had the regulation goal for Minnesota.
Stars 5, Mighty Ducks 3
At Anaheim, California, Antti Miettinen and Jussi Jokinen scored power-play goals less than 1 1/2 minutes apart to lead Dallas over Anaheim for the Pacific Division title.
The victory could have come with a huge loss for Dallas, which lost leading-scorer Mike Modano with an apparent knee injury in the second period.
Niko Kapanen had two goals, one into an empty net. Niclas Hagman had a short-handed goal for the Stars, who lead second-place Anaheim by 13 points with six games remaining.
The victory was the Stars' 50th, one shy of the franchise record set in 1998-1999 when they won their only Stanley Cup.
Sharks 5, Kings 0
At Los Angeles, Jonathan Cheechoo had two goals and an assist as San Jose moved one step closer to securing a playoff spot with a victory over Los Angeles.
Sharks goalie Vesa Toskala made just 14 saves to earn his second shutout of the season. Scott Thornton, Joe Thornton and Steve Bernier scored third-period goals for San Jose as the Sharks moved into a seventh-place tie with Edmonton.
San Jose has a two-point lead over ninth-place Vancouver and a four-point edge over the Kings in tenth.
The Sharks have now won five straight against the Kings and lead the season series 6-1. The teams will meet in the final game of the season in San Jose.
■ Frozen Four
Whether he's rolling on the ice or flying over it, Ross Carlson is dangerous as long as he's near the puck.
Carlson scored an acrobatic goal and his diving attempt at a second earned him an assist in Wisconsin's 5-2 victory over Maine on Thursday night in the NCAA Frozen Four semifinals.
Robbie Earl had two goals and an assist, and Adam Burish and Ben Street also scored for the Badgers (29-10-3), who will play Boston College on Saturday night for the national championship. The Eagles beat North Dakota 6-5 in the first semifinal.
After stealing the puck from Maine's Michel Leveille, Carlson skated down the left side and left his feet to avoid Bret Tyler, the last Maine defender. Carlson maintained control despite his momentum as he landed and fired the shot at Ben Bishop, the 6-foot-7 goalie for the Black Bears.
"I knew I was going to cut to the middle, but I didn't know when or how," Carlson said. "The guy went flying, and I flipped the puck up, knocked it down and shot it."
Said Bishop: "I didn't think he was going to shoot it because he had all the time in the world. When he shot it, it surprised me."
Maine (28-12-2) had played a gritty game to that point, but the goal shook the Black Bears, who gave up a costly scoring chance minutes later.
With 11:44 left, Maine had an opportunity on a short-handed rush, but Wisconsin's ensuing 2-on-1 break left Earl with a sharp wrist shot he fired past Bishop for a 3-1 lead.
"Being on that side, I know what they were going through," Burish said of the momentum swing. "It's frustrating."
Maine finally scored again with 8:39 remaining in the game when Josh Soares left a drop pass for Greg Moore, who found Mike Lundin across the ice for a slap shot past Brian Elliott that cut it to 3-2.
But Wisconsin retook control about a minute later.
Bishop blocked Street's initial shot from the left circle. Carlson was knocked over as he rushed the net and slid through the play, managing to push the puck toward Bishop in the process.
"I was just spinning like a little top," Carlson said. "I accidentally hit the puck, hit the pipe."
Undeterred, Street charged to the net and flipped the follow up over Bishop's outstretched body to put Wisconsin up by two goals again.
"I was coming in too fast, but then I kind of gathered myself and stopped, and then got some composure and buried the backhand," Street said.
Earl made it 5-2 when he added an empty-net goal with 1:44 to play.
Maine, known for its strong special teams, managed to do little right -- giving up a short-handed goal, a power-play goal and going 0-for-7 on the power play.
"Special teams was very important, it always is," Maine coach Tim Whitehead said. "It's probably the only reason why we're here, getting to the Frozen Four because we've had such good special teams. So it is a bit ironic that that cost us in this game."
The Black Bears couldn't match the Badgers' intensity, either, despite multiple scoring opportunities.
On a power play just before the end of the second, Moore fired a shot to Elliott's left, and a rebound bounced to Derek Damon on the other side.
But Damon couldn't get the shot off quick enough as Elliott slid across the crease to stop the putback. Damon committed a penalty in frustration moments later.
"We've got one of the top power plays in the country and we couldn't get a goal," Maine defenseman Travis Wight said. "We're not making any excuses. They are an unreal team and worked hard on us the whole night. They deserved to win."
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