RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Brady Skjei and Sebastian Aho scored as the Carolina Hurricanes beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 2-1 on Sunday night for their sixth win in seven games.
Frederik Andersen made 31 saves and earned his sixth straight win since returning from injury on March 7 as the Hurricanes picked up points in their seventh straight game.
Nicholas Robertson scored and Joseph Woll stopped 41 shots for Toronto, which had a two-game winning streak halted.
The Maple Leafs had a late power play after a Brent Burns’ tripping penalty, and pulled Woll for an extra skater, but failed to score. Toronto finished 0-for-4 on the power play.
Skjei needed just 66 seconds to get the Hurricanes on the scoreboard in the first period. His shot from the point, through three Toronto players, went under Woll’s glove and into the net. Jordan Staal and Jordan Martinook assisted.
Aho made it 2-0 on the power play at 13:55 in the first. His wrist shot from the left circle bounced in off of the skate of Toronto defenceman Jake McCabe. Jake Guentzel and Burns picked up assists.
Elsewhere in the NHL on Sunday:
AVALANCHE 5 PENGUINS 4 (OT)
DENVER (AP) — Jonathan Drouin scored his second goal of the game 54 seconds into overtime, and Colorado rallied from a four-goal deficit to beat Pittsburgh for their ninth straight win.
Nathan MacKinnon extended his point streak to 18 games with a goal and two assists. MacKinnon has at least a point in 34 straight home games, second all-time behind Wayne Gretzky’s 40-game streak in 1988-89. Sean Walker and Yakov Trenin also scored for Colorado.
Drouin, who also had an assist, won it when he beat Pittsburgh goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic for his 14th goal of the season. Nedeljkovic, who had 21 saves, was replaced by Tristan Jarry at 5:17 of the third after a collision with Casey Mittelstadt. Jarry had four saves and allowed the tying goal.
Sidney Crosby had a goal and three assists for his third four-point game, Bryan Rust, Jesse Puljujarvi and Pierre-Olivier Joseph also scored for the Penguins
Crosby assisted on Pittsburgh’s first two goals, stealing the puck from Mikko Rantanen and feeding Rust for a goal with 4:49 left of the first period that gave the Penguins a 2-0 lead.
SENATORS 5 OILERS 3
OTTAWA, Ont. (AP) — Defenceman Jakob Chychrun broke a tie with 3:03 left with his second power-play goal of game to help Ottawa beat Edmonton.
With Edmonton’s Mattias Ekholm off for holding, Chychrun scored on the second of Ottawa’s three third-period shots, with the third coming on Parker Kelly’s empty-netter.
Tim Stutzle and Drake Batherson also scored and Joonas Korpisalo made 33 saves.
Zach Hyman scored his 50th goal for Edmonton, and Connor McDavid had two assists to push his season total to 91 and join Wayne Gretzky and Paul Coffey as the only Oilers to reach 90.
Adam Henrique and Leon Draisaitl also scored and Calvin Pickard made 11 saves for Edmonton.
CAPITALS 3 JETS 0
WASHINGTON (AP) — Alex Ovechkin scored twice to reach 26 goals this season, Charlie Lindgren stopped all 27 shots he faced and Washington beat Winnipeg to move back into a playoff position.
The Capitals have won four of their past five games, a stretch in which Ovechkin has scored eight goals. He had just eight goals in his first 43 games.
Ovechkin getting hot has fuelled Washington’s surge up the standings and reignited talk of him breaking Wayne Gretzky’s career goals record. He is 46 back.
The offensive explosion in the third period — John Carlson’s tiebreaking goal on a power-play blast 1:21 in and Ovechkin’s two — came after Lindgren was the best player on the ice for much of the afternoon. Lindgren outdueled Connor Hellebuyck, the front-runner for the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender, turning aside several high-quality scoring chances throughout.
