The top three teams in the NHL’s Atlantic Division remain separated by just one point after Tampa Bay, Montreal and Detroit all won on Saturday.
Detroit’s 4-1 win cost the New York Islanders a chance to build their one-point gap atop the Metropolitan Division, while Montreal stretched their winning run to five games with an overtime victory against Washington. Both teams remain a point behind the Lightning.
San Jose shut out Chicago in a clash of Western Conference heavyweights, while Boston defeated Los Angeles.
Detroit’s Tomas Tatar and Gustav Nyquist scored power-play goals for the Red Wings, who overcame two second-period penalties and took a 2-0 lead on Brendan Smith’s one-time shot with 47 seconds remaining in the period. Detroit’s Jonathan Ericcson scored in the third period.
Lubomir Visnovsky scored the sole goal for the Islanders on a power play.
Montreal’s Max Pacioretty scored 3 minutes, 8 seconds into overtime to break the deadlock and give the Canadiens a 1-0 win against Washington.
Goaltender Carey Price made 36 saves to post his second shutout in a row.
The Capitals have lost five consecutive road games.
San Jose goalie Antti Niemi made 31 saves in his 31st career shutout as the Sharks beat Chicago 2-0.
Melker Karlsson scored early and Joe Thornton added an empty-net goal for the Sharks, who got their first regulation win over the Blackhawks for three years. Niemi did the rest against his former team as San Jose added the scalp of Chicago to that of Los Angeles and Anaheim in an impressive three-game run against fellow West contenders.
Boston’s Chris Kelly broke a 1-1 tie with 5:27 left in the third period, while Brad Marchand added an empty-netter for his second goal of the game as the Bruins beat Los Angeles 3-1.
Jordan Nolan scored the tying goal for the Kings with seven minutes left before Kelly and Marchand netted for the Bruins.
Dallas scored four power-play goals in a 5-2 win at Winnipeg.
John Klingberg scored a pair of goals and added two assists while Patrick Eaves, Shawn Horcoff and Jason Spezza also scored for the Stars.
Andrew Ladd scored his 18th of the season for the Jets, who have lost three straight.
Tampa Bay extended their home winning streak to 10 and kept their nose in front in the Eastern Conference by beating Columbus 3-1.
Cedric Paquette got his fifth goal in the last three games, while Brett Connolly and Valtteri Filppula also scored and Ben Bishop made 34 saves for the Lightning.
Ryan Johansen scored with 3:26 remaining for the Blue Jackets, who have lost all 18 times they have trailed after two periods.
New York’s Henrik Lundqvist shook off a second-period injury and made 31 saves to help the Rangers beat Carolina 4-1.
Philadelphia sent Toronto spiraling to its ninth straight loss by beating the Maple Leafs 1-0, with Flyers goalie Steve Mason making 30 saves in his shutout.
New Jersey rookie goalie Keith Kinkaid stopped 26 shots as the Devils beat Florida 3-1.
Calgary’s Lance Bouma scored two of Calgary’s four third-period goals as the Flames stormed back to beat Edmonton 4-2.
Ottawa broke away from Arizona to win 7-2, with Mark Stone, Bobby Ryan, Erik Karlsson and Mika Zibanejad each having a goal and an assist.
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