Marc-Andre Fleury on Saturday night recorded his 40th career shutout as the Pittsburgh Penguins beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 4-0 in Phil Kessel’s return to the Air Canada Centre.
Pittsburgh earned their fourth consecutive win and improved to 7-1-0 since losing their first three games of the season. Toronto kept Kessel, Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin off the scoresheet, but the Penguins stars had plenty of help in adding to the Leafs’ early misery this season.
Chris Kunitz, Eric Fehr, Matt Cullen and Patric Hornqvist scored before a Halloween crowd of 19,197 that included Super Mario and Superman. Many left before the final whistle.
Photo: USA Today
Kessel had 395 points in 446 games for the Leafs. However, he was dealt to Pittsburgh in July after president Brendan Shanahan said fans could not understand “people that go out and give half-efforts and that don’t appear to enjoy playing here.”
BRUINS 3, LIGHTNING 1
In Tampa, Florida, Jonas Gustavsson stopped 21 shots and Brett Connolly’s power-play goal snapped a third-period tie to help the Boston Bruins remain unbeaten on the road.
Photo: AP
Connolly scored during a 13-second five-on-three opportunity with just more than 14 minutes remaining, and the Bruins extended their point streak to seven games (6-0-1) after opening the season with three consecutive losses. They also improved to 5-0-0 on the road in the club’s longest such streak since winning a franchise-best nine straight in March last year.
Tampa Bay continued to sputter offensively, losing their fourth straight game. The defending Eastern Conference champions led the NHL in scoring a year ago, but have been limited to two goals during their longest skid in two seasons.
BLUES 3, WILD 2, OT
In St Louis, Missouri, David Backes scored at 4 minutes, 26 seconds of overtime for his second goal of the game to send St Louis to the win.
Backes had time to load up on a shot from the high slot, and he drove it past Devan Dubnyk off a setup from Ty Rattie. Backes had no goals and two assists this season coming into the night.
The Blues surrendered a 2-0 lead in the first period, but won their third in a row and improved to 8-2-1 while playing without several top players. Forward Vladimir Tarasenko (lower body) joined Paul Stastny, Jaden Schwartz and Kevin Shattenkirk on the injury list.
Alexander Steen also scored and Jake Allen had 29 saves for St Louis, who allowed just one shot during Minnesota’s two-man advantage of 62 seconds in the second period.
Jason Zucker and Erik Haula scored for Minnesota.
STARS 5, SHARKS 3
In Dallas, Antoine Roussel broke a third-period tie for the second time in three games as Dallas went on to the win.
The game-winners are the only goals this season for Roussel, who also had two assists against San Jose.
John Klingberg’s shot from the right point hit Sharks goalie Alex Stalock’s pads and Roussel’s skate, and the puck trickled across the goal line with 6 minutes, 27 seconds to play. Tyler Seguin added a power-play goal into an empty net.
Dallas have won eight of their last nine games. San Jose have lost five of six.
For San Jose, Joe Pavelski and Joel Ward scored on the power play, and Matt Nieto had a short-handed goal.
KINGS 4, PREDATORS 3, OT
In Los Angeles, Jeff Carter scored 4 minutes, 42 seconds into overtime and Tyler Toffoli continued his strong start with two more goals as Los Angeles extended their winning streak to seven games by beating Nashville.
Rookie Andy Andreoff also scored, and Jonathan Quick made 31 saves for the Kings, whose streak began after a 0-3 start.
Nashville defenseman Ryan Ellis scored the tying goal with 6 minutes, 4 seconds left in the third period, and Pekka Rinne stopped 25 shots for the Predators, who had won the previous five meetings — all by one-goal margins.
James Neal and Shea Weber scored power-play goals less than three-and-a-half minutes apart in the second period for Nashville, while teammates Filip Forsberg and Roman Josi each had two assists.
In other results, it was:
‧ Red Wings 5, Senators 3
‧ Devils 3, Islanders 2, SO
‧ Capitals 2, Panthers 1, OT
‧ Flames 5, Oilers 4
‧ Jets 3, Blue Jackets 2
Aaliyah Edwards on Monday pulled off the stunner of the opening round of the Unrivaled one-on-one tournament, beating top-seeded Breanna Stewart 12-0. The tournament to be played over three days featured 23 of the WNBA’s 36 players. A few had other commitments and a couple others were out with injuries. Stewart got the ball first against Edwards and missed a contested layup. Edwards then hit a three-pointer from the corner and a jumper from the elbow to go up 5-0. The player who scores keeps the basketball. Edwards hit two layups and a three-pointer to seal the win. Stewart, a two-time WNBA Most Valuable Player,
The Philippines curling team has been rocking it in Harbin, claiming the tropical nation’s first Asian Winter Games medal yesterday with a victory in the men’s final against South Korea. The team of Marc Pfister, Alan Frei, Christian Haller, Enrico Pfister and alternate Benjo Delarmente took gold with a 5-3 win at Harbin Pingfang Curling Arena. The Philippines Olympic Committee was quick to celebrate with a post on Instagram to mark the historic gold. “This is the first-ever medal for the Philippines at the Asian Winter Games, and the highest achievement for a Southeast Asian athlete in the Games’ history! What an incredible
Taiwan’s Lin Yun-ju and Kao Cheng-jui were defeated by their Chinese counterparts 3-0 on Saturday in the men’s doubles final at the World Table Tennis (WTT) Singapore Smash. Lin and Kao received their silver medals after being defeated by third-seeded duo Lin Shidong and Wang Chuqin of China 2-11, 4-11, 11-13. The Taiwan pair were left playing catch-up early in the match after the Chinese duo proved unstoppable in the first and second game. Although Lin and Kao picked up their pace in the third game and at one point took a 10-8 lead, they were crucially unable to take
Taiwan’s Wu Fang-hsien on Tuesday dumped compatriot and second seed Hsieh Su-wei out of the women’s doubles at the Qatar Open to set up another potential Taiwanese showdown, while world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka suffered a shock defeat in the second round. Wu and partner Jiang Xinyu, who earlier this year won the ASB Classic in Auckland and the Hobart International, defeated Hsieh and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia 6-2, 6-7 (3/7), 10-5 in 1 hour, 29 minutes on Grandstand Court 3 at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex. Wu and Jiang on Sunday advanced to the round-of-16 with a 7-6 (7/7),