The Anaheim Ducks clinched a much-needed 3-2 victory over the Los Angeles Kings in Game 3 of their Western Conference semi-final series on Thursday.
After dropping the first two games at home in their best-of-seven series, Anaheim coach Bruce Boudreau made some changes that paid off as the Ducks cut the Kings’ series lead to 2-1.
The biggest change was inserting goaltender Fredrick Anderson in place of Jonas Hiller, who played well, but lost the first two games of the series.
Photo: AFP
Anderson was strong before leaving late in the third period with an injury.
Anaheim opened the scoring on a power play early in the first period, with Corey Perry grabbing his third goal of the post-season.
The Ducks got another power-play goal in the second, when Nick Bonino set up Teemu Selanne.
“Since Game 6 against Dallas, he seems like he’s found the fountain of youth. I hope that keeps going,” Boudreau said. “The reason Teemu has almost 700 goals is because he goes to the net and he stops.”
Not surprisingly, Kings coach Darryl Sutter had a different take on the play.
“We needed to make a better play there,” he said.
Kings defenseman Drew Doughty was on the wrong end of things late in the third period.
As he tried to make too many moves with the puck, Anaheim pinched it and launched a break on which defenseman Ben Lovejoy scored to make it 3-1.
“It plants a seed of doubt in their minds and that’s what we wanted to do,” Lovejoy said.
The Kings got on the board in the second period through Jeff Carer and made it 3-2 on Mike Richards’ goal with 30 seconds left, but they had not enough time to find the equalizer.
BRUINS, CANADIENS
AP, MONTREAL
Matt Fraser scored at 1 minute, 19 seconds of overtime to give the Boston Bruins a 1-0 victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Thursday, leveling the Eastern Conference semi-final series 2-2.
Making his NHL playoff debut after being called up on Wednesday from Providence of the American Hockey League, Fraser jumped into a scramble in front of goalie Carey Price and slid the puck under him into the net.
Fraser scored after Johnny Boychuk’s shot from the point took a high hop off the end boards, and Price and defenseman Mike Weaver had trouble controlling the bouncing puck.
Game 5 is scheduled for tomorrow night in Boston.
Tuukka Rask made 33 saves for Boston, while Price stopped 34 shots.
The teams played their first scoreless period in regulation time in the series in a tight-checking first, marked mainly by icings and missed passes.
Boston’s Carl Soderberg had the best chance in the final minute after Montreal defenseman P.K. Subban’s blind back pass was intercepted, but Price got a piece of it as it went off the crossbar.
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