Nashville defenseman Shea Weber scored the winner in a 3-2 victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Monday and was roundly booed in the same arena where he will be a cheered on as a home favorite at next month’s Winter Olympics.
Weber can expect a much warmer reception when he plays for Canada than the cool send-off he received after blasting the power-play strike past Olympic teammate Roberto Luongo with just over four minutes left to play.
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard cheers in this place, so that will be nice,” Weber told reporters. “It definitely had a little bit of that Olympic feeling. I think with the hectic schedule right now, we’re playing every other night, it’s probably a good thing. If we weren’t playing so much, there would be more time to sit back and think about it but right now we’re focused on winning games.”
PHOTO: REUTERS
The Predators scored all three goals on special teams, Joel Ward opening the scoring on a short-handed effort and Ryan Jones adding a second period power-play tally.
Red hot Alex Burrows, who had back-to-back hat-tricks in wins over Phoenix and Columbus last week, handled all the Canucks scoring, the brace giving him nine in his last five games.
However, Burrows and line mate Henrik Sedin, the NHL’s leading scorer, were both in the penalty box when Weber converted during a 4-on-3 advantage to clinch the win.
A furious Burrows told reporters after the game he had been targeted by referee Stephane Auger, saying the official had told him during the warm up that he was looking for a reason to get him.
“It was personal, it started in warm up before the anthem,” Burrows said. “The ref came over to me and said I made him look bad in Nashville. He said he was going to get me back tonight and he did his job in the third. He called me on a diving call I didn’t think was diving, he got me on an interference call that I have no idea how he could call that and it changed the game.”
“It sucks right now for teammates that are battling hard for 60 minutes to win a hockey game ... because of a guy’s ego it just blows everything out of proportion and they’re making bad calls and the fans are paying for it and we’re paying for it,” he said.
Canucks coach Alain Vigneault said the team would investigate Burrows’ allegations and ask the NHL to look into the charges if they believed them to be valid.
“We’re definitely going to look into that,” Vigneault said. “If those [allegations] are true we’ll definitely bring it up.”
WILD 4, PENGUINS 3
At St Paul, Minnesota, Guillaume Latendresse scored the go-ahead goal midway through the third period after getting a career-high three assists to give the hosts a win over Pittsburgh.
The Penguins lost after scoring first for only the fifth time in 22 games this season.
He scored again later, tying the game at 3 in the first minute of the third period to move past Marian Gaborik for second place in the NHL with 29 goals.
Eric Belanger, Martin Havlat and Cal Clutterbuck also scored for the Wild, and Niklas Backstrom had 45 saves. Pascal Dupuis set up Crosby’s first score and added a goal of his own for Pittsburgh.
Sharks 2, Kings 1
At Los Angeles, Evgeni Nabokov made 33 saves and Dan Boyle had a goal and an assist as San Jose ended Los Angeles’ recent mastery over the Sharks.
Dany Heatley scored his 26th goal for the Pacific Division-leading Sharks, who had lost two of three, including an embarrassing 6-2 defeat to Los Angeles at the Shark Tank seven days earlier.
Randy Jones scored and Erik Ersberg stopped 34 shots for the slumping Kings, who have lost three straight and seven of 10.
Avalanche 3, Flames 2, SO
At Calgary, Canada, Chris Stewart scored once in regulation and got the decisive goal in the shootout, while Craig Anderson made 44 saves to lead Colorado.
It was the fourth straight 3-2 victory for Colorado over Calgary in the season series and moved the Avalanche into a tie with the Flames atop the Northwest Division.
Paul Stastny also scored for Colorado, which has won seven of its last nine road games.
Rene Bourque and Dustin Boyd scored for Calgary.
Bologna on Thursday advanced past Empoli to reach their first Coppa Italia final in more than half a century. Thijs Dallinga’s 87th-minute header earned Bologna a 2-1 win and his side advanced 5-1 on aggregate. Giovanni Fabbian opened the scoring for Bologna with a header seven minutes in. Then Viktor Kovalenko equalized for Empoli in the 30th minute by turning in a rebound to finish off a counterattack. Bologna won the first leg 3-0. In the May 14 final in Rome, Bologna are to face AC Milan, who eliminated city rivals Inter 4-1 on aggregate following a 3-0 win on Wednesday. Bologna last reached the
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