The Colorado Avalanche extended their winning start to the season to four games by beating the Boston Bruins 2-0 on Thursday, with goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere making 39 saves in his 37th NHL shutout.
Among other results, Anaheim routed the New York Rangers to celebrate their home opener, while Columbus kept Buffalo winless and Tampa Bay put seven goals past state rival Florida.
The Avalanches’ 4-0 start under new coach Patrick Roy is their best mark since the franchise relocated from Quebec to Colorado for the 1995-1996 season.
Giguere, making his first start of the season, made several sparkling saves. His best came midway through the second period when he stopped Patrice Bergeron on a two-on-one rush.
Ryan O’Reilly gave the Avalanche the lead in the final minute of the first period and Matt Duchene sealed the win with an empty-net goal in the closing seconds.
Anaheim’s Jakob Silfverberg scored twice and Jonas Hiller made 34 saves for his 17th NHL shutout, as the Ducks downed the New York Rangers 6-0.
Teemu Selanne and Mathieu Perreault assisted on both goals by linemate Silfverberg, who had the second two-goal game of his career. He has scored four goals in his first four games with the team. Dustin Penner and Daniel Winnik each added a goal and an assist.
New York has been outscored 15-2 over its past two games.
Carolina’s Nathan Gerbe scored the tiebreaking goal at 6 minutes, 59 seconds of the third period to lift the Hurricanes to a 3-2 win over Washington.
Anton Khudobin stopped 30 shots, while Elias Lindholm and former Capitals forward Alexander Semin also scored for the Hurricanes.
Jason Chimera and Alex Ovechkin had goals for the Capitals.
Columbus’ Marian Gaborik had a goal and two assists in the Blue Jackets’ 4-1 victory over Buffalo.
Cam Atkinson, Nick Foligno and Brandon Dubinsky also scored for Columbus.
The Sabres have one point from five games; their worst start to a season since they went were winless in their first seven games of the 1999-2000 season.
Phoenix’s Michael Stone scored with 4:47 left, breaking a tie and leading the Coyotes to a 4-2 win over Detroit.
Derek Morris and Antoine Vermette both had a goal and an assist, and Mikkel Boedker also scored for Phoenix.
Joakim Andersson and Jonathan Ericsson scored for Detroit.
Tampa Bay’s Steven Stamkos had three goals and an assist, while Valtteri Filppula added two goals as the Lightning cruised to a 7-2 win over Florida.
Martin St Louis added a goal and an assist for the Lightning, who have won three in a row.
Florida, who lost three of four during a season-opening road trip, got goals from Brad Boyes and Jonathan Huberdeau.
Stamkos, second in the NHL with 29 goals during the abbreviated current season, stopped a five-game scoring drought, dating to last season.
The center completed his sixth NHL hat-trick with a one-timer from the top of the left circle during a power play at 12:25 of the third.
Minnesota’s Matt Cooke gave the Wild the lead in the second period and they hung on for a 2-1 win over Winnipeg.
Toronto’s Jonathan Bernier made 36 saves, while Phil Kessel had a goal and two assists to lead the Maple Leafs past Nashville 4-0.
San Jose Sharks goalie Antti Niemi made 25 saves, and Matt Pelech scored his first NHL goal as the Sharks improved to a 4-0 record by beating the Vancouver Canucks 4-1.
Montreal’s Brendan Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk each had a goal and an assist in a 4-1 win over Edmonton.
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
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