Carey Price made 38 saves for his second shutout in his last three starts, while Alex Semin scored his first goal as the Montreal Canadiens beat the St Louis Blues 3-0 on Tuesday night to win their team-record seventh in a row to begin the season. Max Pacioretty and Torrey Mitchell also scored for the Canadiens, who broke the Blues’ four-game streak.
Price, the league’s most valuable player and top goaltender last season, has allowed only six goals in six starts. It was the 36th shutout of his career. He posted a 25-save shutout against the New York Rangers on Thursday last week, and allowed one goal on 22 shots in a 4-1 win over Detroit on Saturday night to earn NHL first star of the week honors.
His save of the night was a spectacular glove effort early in the second frame on Vladimir Tarasenko, who was held off the scoresheet for the first time this season.
Photo: Graham Hughes, The Canadian Press via AP
ISLANDERS 3, BLUE JACKETS 0
In Columbus, Ohio, Jaroslav Halak stopped 37 shots for his 37th career shutout to lead the New York Islanders to their fourth straight win.
Nikolay Kulemin gave the Islanders the lead late in the first period, and Thomas Hickey, Cal Clutterbuck and John Tavares all scored in the third period. Halak made a second straight start after returning from an upper-body injury sustained during the pre-season.
The Blue Jackets extended their franchise-worst winless start and became the third team in the NHL’s modern history to open a season 0-7. Curtis McElhinney finished with 25 saves and was steady throughout, making several key saves to keep Columbus within striking distance for most of the game.
DEVILS 3, COYOTES 2, OT
In Newark, New Jersey, Travis Zajac had a goal, two assists and set up Adam Larrson’s game-winner 43 seconds into overtime to lift New Jersey.
Larsson slam dunked the game winner to cap a three-on-one break that started after he knocked Martin Hanzal off the puck in the Devils’ zone.
Mike Cammalleri also scored for New Jersey and Cory Schneider made 18 saves as the Devils won their second straight overtime game under new coach John Hynes after opening the season 0-3-1.
Anthony Duclair and Mikkel Boedker scored for Arizona, who have lost three in a row. Mike Smith made 22 saves in the opener of a five-game east coast road trip for Arizona.
PENGUINS 3, PANTHERS 2, OT
In Pittsburgh, Evgeni Malkin scored on the power play in overtime and Sidney Crosby picked up his first goal of the season to lead Pittsburgh.
Malkin’s third goal in as many games withstood a video review. He took a pass from Kris Letang at the top of the right circle and fired a slap shot past Roberto Luongo.
Crosby netted his first three points of the season on the first-period goal and two assists.
Phil Kessel scored his second goal and Malkin has five points during a four-game point streak for the Penguins, who won their third straight. Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 31 shots.
Quinton Howden and Derek MacKenzie scored goals for the Panthers, while Luongo made 32 saves.
STARS 2, FLYERS 1
In Philadelphia, Tyler Seguin and Jamie Benn each had a goal and an assist as Dallas won their fourth straight.
Sean Couturier scored for the Flyers, who were playing for the first time since beating Chicago Wednesday last week.
Antti Niemi made 34 saves to improve to 3-1 in four career starts against Philadelphia. Niemi was in because starting goalie Kari Lehtonen is 1-10-2 in 13 games against Philadelphia.
Steve Mason made 30 saves for the Flyers in his return for the Flyers after sitting out the past two games due to personal reasons.
PREDATORS 5, LIGHTNING 4, SO
In Nashville, Tennessee, Filip Forsberg scored the only goal of the shootout to help Nashville beat Tampa Bay.
James Neal scored twice and Mike Fisher and Shea Weber also scored for the Predators, winners of five of six. Nashville’s past two wins have come via a shootout.
Predators goalie Pekka Rinne allowed four goals on 29 shots through overtime, but he was sharp in the shootout, denying all three Lightning shooters.
Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov, Ryan Callahan and Erik Condra scored for the Lightning, who have dropped three of four.
In the tiebreaker, Forsberg skated to the right and beat Lightning goalie Ben Bishop with a quick wrist-shot.
CAPITALS 6, FLAMES 2
In Calgary, Alberta, Nicklas Backstrom scored twice, while Alex Ovechkin added a goal and an assist for Washington.
Andre Burakovsky, T.J. Oshie and Jason Chimera also scored, and Evgeny Kuznetsov added three assists. The Capitals, playing their first road game of the season, have opened with four wins in five games.
Sean Monahan and Mark Giordano scored for Calgary, who have lost five of their first six games while opening with four straight losses on home ice for the first time in franchise history.
Ovechkin gave the Capitals the lead for good 30 seconds into the second period. His long shot was stopped by Flames goalie Karri Ramo, but mishandled, allowing the Washington captain to poke in the rebound and put Washington ahead 2-1. It was Ovechkin’s fourth goal of the season and 900th career point.
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