Mason Raymond had his second career hat trick — scoring at even strength, short-handed and on a power play — and added an assist, leading the Vancouver Canucks to their third straight victory, a 7-2 defeat of the Calgary Flames.
Daniel Sedin, Jeff Tambellini, Alex Burrows and Dan Hamhuis also scored, and Roberto Luongo made 18 saves. The Canucks improved to 13-7-3 and moved a point ahead of Colorado for the Northwest Division lead. Alex Tanguay and Tim Jackman scored for Calgary. The Flames have lost five of their last seven at home.
Raymond opened the scoring two minutes into the first period, and assisted on Tambellini’s goal that made it 2-0 at 8:51. Raymond added a short-handed goal at 1:03 of the third to make it 4-2, and completed the hat trick on a power play with 4:23 remaining. He has seven goals in 23 games this season.
Photo: REUTERS
Bruins 3, Flyers 0
In Philadelphia, Tim Thomas stopped Scott Hartnell on a second-period penalty shot and finished with 41 saves for his NHL-leading fifth shutout of the season as the Boston Bruins beat the Flyers on Wednesday night.
Thomas, with an NHL-best 1.46 goals-against average and .955 save percentage, helped Boston beat Philadelphia in their first meeting since May when the Flyers rallied from a 3-0 series deficit to edge the Bruins in the Eastern Conference semifinals. Patrice Bergeron, Tyler Seguin and Milan Lucic scored for Boston.
Oilers 4, Canadiens 3, OT
In Montreal, Dustin Penner scored at 2:28 of overtime and Ales Hemsky had a goal and two assists in Edmonton’s comeback victory.
Sam Gagner equalized at 3-all with a short-handed goal with 6:43 left in the third.
Hemsky returned to the Oilers’ lineup after missing three games because of a groin injury. He drew Edmonton to 3-2 with his seventh goal at 10:02 of the third and got his second assist of the game on Gagner’s goal after setting up Kurtis Foster’s power-play tally late in the first.
Devan Dubnyk made 36 saves to help the Oilers win consecutive games for the first time since the beginning of the season. Roman Hamrlik, Mathieu Darche and Scott Gomez scored for Montreal.
Predators 4, Blue Jackets 3, SO
In Columbus, Ohio, longtime Columbus nemesis Steve Sullivan scored the only goal in the shootout for Nashville, and Pekka Rinne stopped Jake Voracek, Rick Nash and Antoine Vermette in the tiebreaker.
Colin Wilson, Sergei Kostitsyn and Kevin Klein scored in regulation for Nashville. Vermette scored twice and Kris Russell added a goal for Columbus.
Capitals 4, Blues 1
In St Louis, Missouri, Semyon Varlamov made 37 saves for his fourth straight victory since recovering from a groin injury and Washington got back at the goalie who eliminated the Capitals in the playoffs last spring.
In other NHL action, it was:
‧ Coyotes 4, Wild 2
‧ Ducks 5, Panthers 3
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