Roberto Luongo made 32 saves for his second shutout of the season and 53rd overall, leading the Vancouver Canucks to their fourth straight victory, 3-0 over the Chicago Blackhawks on Friday.
Stanley Cup champions Chicago suffered their eighth regulation loss at home, matching their regular-season total from last season. The Blackhawks are 6-8-0 at home after going 29-8-4 last season at United Center.
Tanner Glass, Christian Ehrhoff and Henrik Sedin scored to give the Canucks and Luongo the all the offense they needed to avenge a 7-1 home loss to the Blackhawks on Nov. 20.
Red Wings 4, Ducks 0
In Anaheim, Jimmy Howard made 41 saves for his fifth NHL shutout and Johan Franzen scored on Detroit’s first shot of the game.
The shutout was the second this season for Howard, including a 4-0 win over the Ducks on opening night at Detroit. Tomas Holmstrom, Dan Cleary and Valtteri Filppula also scored for the Western Conference-leading Red Wings, who won their fourth in a row and ninth in 11 games to take a five-point lead over Dallas and Vancouver.
Rangers 2, Islanders 0
In New York, Henrik Lundqvist earned his fourth shutout of the season and Marc Staal scored in the second period to help the New York Rangers sweep the home-and-away series against the Islanders.
One night after the Rangers recovered from a pair of blown two-goal leads in a 6-5 win in Long Island, the teams engaged in a defensive struggle. The Rangers won despite recording only 21 shots on Dwayne Roloson, largely because they gave up a season-low 17 to the Islanders.
Brian Boyle sealed it with an empty-net goal with 2.6 seconds left. The Rangers have won six of eight.
Sabres 5, Blue Jackets 0
In Buffalo, Ryan Miller made 19 saves for Buffalo for his first shutout of the season and 18th overall and Drew Stafford had a goal and an assist in his return from a shoulder injury.
The Sabres won for just the third time in their 11 games against the Blue Jackets.
Thomas Vanek and Tyler Ennis each had a goal and two assists, Jochen Hecht and Jason Pominville also scored, and Derek Roy chipped in a pair of assists for the Sabres.
Flames 3, Wild 2, SO
In St Paul, Minnesota, Rene Bourque and Alex Tanguay scored in a shootout to lift Calgary past Minnesota.
Flames goalie Henrik Karlsson stopped Minnesota’s Mikko Koivu and Pierre-Marc Bouchard to start the shootout, but the Wild’s Patrick O’Sullivan extended the tiebreaker.
Bourque then beat Niklas Backstrom between the legs to give the Flames only their fourth victory in their past 12 games.
Tanguay and Mark Giordano scored in regulation for the Flames.
Karlsson, playing for only the fourth time this season, stopped 20 shots for Calgary.
Martin Havlat and Bouchard scored in regulation for the Wild.
Hurricanes 2, Avalanche 1, OT
In Raleigh, North Carolina, Brandon Sutter scored at 1:15 of overtime, rookie Jeff Skinner had his eighth goal of the season and Cam Ward made 34 saves to help Carolina edge Colorado.
In OT, Sutter darted in on the right side, beating goalie Craig Anderson to the left for his fifth goal.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB