ST. PAUL, Minn. — Alex Ovechkin didn’t score for Washington, staying at 889 career goals and six away from breaking Wayne Gretzky’s all-time record.

Ovechkin did initiate a memorable moment on the ice in Minnesota on Thursday night, though.

The three-time NHL MVP, who has been in the spotlight for months amid his pursuit of Gretzky’s career goal mark, hustled over toward the tunnel behind the bench after the horn sounded on Washington’s 4-2 loss to make sure all of the Capitals came back on the ice to shake hands with retiring Wild goalie Marc-Andre Fleury. Ovechkin was the first to greet Fleury at mid-ice as they shared a hug and a laugh.

Fleury, who’s in his 21st and assuredly final season in the league, was on the home bench all night while Filip Gustavsson manned the net.

Ovechkin mentioned to the team in the morning that it would be the last matchup against Fleury, who faced Ovechkin and the Capitals frequently over the first 13 seasons of his career with Pittsburgh. Ovechkin had 28 goals in 47 games against Fleury, his most against any goalie.

“He’s had so many battles with the Caps, with ‘O,’” Washington coach Spencer Carbery said. “Pretty classy to be able to send him off and just say how impressive a career he had.”

Capitals center Dylan Strome played briefly with Fleury in Chicago.

“Everyone knows he’s one of the best people of all time in the game, so the little respect we can show him at the end of the game I think goes a long way,” Strome said.

The Wild were impressed by the gesture, even if they weren’t surprised.

“Every team we go to, you see the signs. Everyone loves him, and everyone loves playing against him,” Gustavsson said. “I think no one really would say anything bad about him.”

At some point soon, the Wild will likely find themselves doing their own internal tribute.

“It’s awesome to see. It’s fun for him, and I am happy for him,” defenseman Jonas Brodin said. “He’s a great person and one of the best I have ever played with, so it’s pretty cool. It’s special to have that when you quit hockey someday, that you played with that guy, for sure.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Washington Capitals signed defenseman Dylan McIlrath to a two-year, $1.6 million contract Thursday.

The 32-year-old McIlrath has two assists in 11 games this season. He was set to become an unrestricted free agent after the season.

McIlrath captained Washington affiliate Hershey’s 2023 and 2024 Calder Cup championship teams in the American Hockey League. The 6-foot-6 defender has three goals and six assists in 86 career NHL regular-season games with Washington, Florida, the New York Rangers and Detroit.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Sidney Crosby broke an NHL record he shared with Wayne Gretzky for point-per-game consistency.

By scoring 8:49 into the first period for Pittsburgh against Buffalo on Thursday night, Crosby registered his 80th point to assure he’ll finish his 20th NHL season averaging at least a point per outing.

The Penguins captain surpassed the mark first set by Gretzky, who finished all but his 20th and final NHL season in 1998-99 averaging a point a game.

The 37-year-old Crosby reached 80 points in his 72nd game in a season during which he has already missed two outings due to injury. Pittsburgh has eight games remaining on its schedule.

Crosby’s 26th goal of the season cut Buffalo’s lead to 2-1. He was set up by Rickard Rakell’s pass from below the goal-line to the left of the net. Crosby used his right skate to stop the pass and kick into his stick before snapping it inside the right post.

Selected first overall in the 2005 draft, Crosby has spent his entire career in Pittsburgh, where he’s a three-time Stanley Cup champion.

Meanwhile, Washington’s Alex Ovechkin is closing in on breaking Gretzky’s NHL career record of 894 career goals. Ovechkin scored his 889th goal Tuesday night.

The Philadelphia Flyers fired coach John Tortorella on Thursday with nine games left in another losing season for a franchise that hasn’t been in the playoffs since 2020.

The Flyers are last in the Metropolitan Division at 28-36-9 for 65 points under the notoriously brusque Tortorella. The Flyers suffered their sixth straight loss Tuesday, 7-2 to Toronto.

Tortorella, who won a Stanley Cup with Tampa Bay in 2004, said after the game he was not “really interested in learning how to coach in this type of season, where we’re at right now. But I have to do a better job. So this falls on me, getting the team prepared to play the proper way until we get to the end.”

The Flyers named Brad Shaw the interim coach, starting with Thursday’s game against Montreal.

“John played a vital role in our rebuild. He set a standard of play and re-established what it means to be a Philadelphia Flyer,” general manager Danny Briere said. “John’s passion on the bench was only equaled by his charitable work in our community. As we move into the next chapter of this rebuild, I felt this was the best for our team to move forward. I’d like to thank John for his tireless work and commitment to the Flyers.”

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Lindy Ruff gave a brief wave to acknowledge the applauding crowd before turning up the tunnel in what proved to be a modest moment to celebrate his 600th career win as Buffalo Sabres coach.

Humbling as it was in becoming the NHL’s second coach to achieve the milestone with one franchise, Ruff was preoccupied with other thoughts following a 3-2 win over the Ottawa Senators.

Weighing heavily on Ruff in the closing weeks of his first season in his second stint in Buffalo was the disappointment of falling well short of his objective in transforming the Sabres into winners . And the frustration of a job unfinished compelled him to already begin looking ahead to next season, with Buffalo all but assured of extending its NHL-record playoff drought to a 14th season.

“I’m a guy that from Day 1 always thinks I can fix everything. And I haven’t been able to fix everything,” Ruff said.

“This year has been a disappointment for me,” he added, specifically referring to the team’s playoff hopes unraveling during an 0-10-3 skid spanning November and December. “I feel personally responsible that there were games that were right there that could’ve turned it and got it the other way. And we didn’t get it done.”

As for the milestone, Ruff wasn’t even aware of his achievement until a team official told him as he was leaving the bench moments after the final horn, and just before the public address announcer informed the crowd.

“I really wasn’t aware of it, but obviously feels good. I mean, just to get the win tonight felt good, how hard we battled,” he said of an outing in which Buffalo overcame two one-goal deficits and won on Tage Thompson’s go-ahead goal 1:23 into the third period.

“I’ve been fortunate,” he added, listing former GMs and owners. “A lot of good people around me that have helped throughout the years, and coaches, unbelievable fan support here in this building.”

Ruff improved his Buffalo record to 600-467-90 and 78 ties, and trails only Al Arbour, who won 740 games with the New York Islanders.

The 65-year-old Ruff got his second chance to coach the Sabres in April after Don Granato was fired following three-plus seasons. In being rehired after head-coaching stops in Dallas and New Jersey, Ruff became the Sabres seventh coach since he was fired two months into the labor-dispute-shortened 2014 season.

In 2011, he was Buffalo’s last to coach lead the team to the playoffs. Ruff’s first term in Buffalo lasted 14-plus-season, during which was the NHL’s coach of the year in 2006. Under his watch, the Sabres lost the Stanley Cup Final in six games to Dallas in 1999, and lost in the Eastern Conference finals to Carolina and Ottawa in 2006 and ’07.

Ruff’s ties to Buffalo date to his playing days in the 1980s, when he spent nine of his fist 12 NHL seasons with the Sabres, including a three-year term as captain.

Overall, Ruff’s 1,844 games coached rank third on the NHL list. He ranks fifth with 893 career victories and second with 714 losses.

What encourages him is how the Sabres have responded of late.

Though still sitting last in the Eastern Conference standings, Buffalo has won two straight following an 5-3 win over West-leading Winnipeg, and is 5-3 in its past eight outings.

“The way we’re playing now, these last 40 games is conducive to winning,” Ruff said.

He likened his desire to fix things to tinkering with his car and being a handyman around the house.

“I can honestly say it drives my wife crazy, when she thinks I can fix everything,” Ruff said with a laugh. “I’ve had to call a few electricians over time.”

Matthew Tkachuk has not been on the ice for the Florida Panthers since early February, Aaron Ekblad is not eligible to play again until Game 3 of the first round of the postseason , and Brad Marchand still hasn’t debuted with his new team since joining at the trade deadline.

Those are big holes down the stretch, and yet they keep on rolling. The Panthers won nine of their first 14 games since the NHL season resumed after the 4 Nations Face-Off break and remain atop the Atlantic Division with 11 left to play.

Seth Jones has fit in perfectly since they acquired him from Chicago, and the defending Stanley Cup champions look primed for another playoff run.

“That’s the way it goes,” said Sam Bennett, whose 12 points over this span are tied with captain Aleksander Barkov for second-most on the roster behind Sam Reinhart (13). “You’re going to be down important guys at important times of the year. In the playoffs, especially, there’s going to be times that you lose guys and it’s up to us to step up and every guy’s got to play a little harder, play a little bigger when we have those really important guys out of our lineup.”

Tkachuk, Florida’s heart-and-soul top forward, was injured playing for the U.S. at the 4 Nations on Feb. 15. Ekblad, the top-four defenseman in his 11th season in the league, was suspended 20 games on March 10 for performance-enhancing drugs.

And the team knew Marchand would not be available right away after getting hurt March 1 in what turned out to be his final game with the Boston Bruins. Coach Paul Maurice said the 36-year-old was skating hard and could be back as soon as the end of this week, if not early April.

Even without those guys, the Panthers have allowed opponents to score just two goals a game during this stretch — tied for the fewest in the NHL.

“What separates them and why I think they’re the best defending team in the league is they protect the net front and the slot better than anybody in the NHL for my money,” Washington Capitals coach Spencer Carbery said before his team beat Florida. “And that’s partly the way that their structure is, so the system, but also the commitment to win your 1-on-1 (matchups) and protect that area is elite, elite, elite.”

Maurice thinks the Panthers have handled the situation really well, absent a clunker of a 3-1 defeat at Montreal. After losing to Washington, the affable coach who has been behind the bench for over 2,000 NHL games deadpanned that despite a sub-.500 road trip, “We won’t fold the season.”

Overall, he has been pleased.

“We’ve been pretty good,” Maurice said. “We’ve played playoff games without Bennett, without Barkov — with 2out a number of players. ... We just have some experience with it.”

Since hiring Maurice and trading for Tkachuk in the summer of 2023, Florida has won seven of eight playoff series while making back-to-back trips to the final and captured the first championship in franchise history. The hope is to do more of that after getting Marchand and Jones, who has been playing big minutes — over 25 a game — in Ekblad’s absence.

“He’s been great,” forward Jonah Gadjovich said of Jones. “He’s been great on the ice and off the ice. He’s a great guy, obviously a great player, as well, so we’re so happy to have him and his leadership around the locker room.”

Inside the locker room, Gadjovich said being without top players is no excuse, so he and his teammates are not treating it as such.

“Obviously we’re down a lot of guys right now, and I think we’re looking forward to having them back whenever they come back,” he said. “Whoever’s in the lineup just has to do their job. We all know how to play. We all know Panther hockey and what’s expected of us.”

LOS ANGELES — When Los Angeles goalie Darcy Kuemper came out to center ice ready to fight his Boston Bruins counterpart Jeremy Swayman, Kings coach Jim Hiller was only thinking about all the bad things that could have happened.

Fortunately for Hiller, officials prevented Kuemper and Swayman from actually coming to blows late in the second period of the Kings’ 7-2 win over the Bruins.

“I mean, nobody wants to see that,” Hiller said before catching himself. “Well, I shouldn’t say that. Neither teams’ coaches want to see that because those are some pretty important players you don’t want busting up hands or anything like that.”

The near-fracas came about after Bruins forward Marat Khusnutdinov made contact with Kuemper after he was hit from behind by Kings forward Tanner Jeannot, resulting in a goaltender interference penalty. Kuemper forcefully responded, grabbing Khusnutdinov around the head and neck, taking off the forward’s helmet and drawing a roughing penalty.

Swayman objected to Kuemper’s conduct, coming out to center ice and inviting Kuemper to join him. Kuemper did as he dropped his gloves, prompting Swayman to drop his gloves and take off his helmet. Referee Graham Skilliter got in front of Swayman, and linesman Travis Toomey skated in front of Kuemper and kept the goalies apart.

“He touched one of my guys, and I think that was something I’m not going to accept,” Swayman said. “And kudos to him, he stepped up. Just it got broken up.”

Kuemper and Swayman both received minor penalties for leaving their creases.

“Heated moments, you know,” Kings forward Adrian Kempe said. “It happens. It’s fun for the fans, I guess.”

There has not been a goalie fight in the NHL since the COVID-19 pandemic, with the last scrap between Edmonton’s Mike Smith and Calgary’s Cam Talbot happening on Feb. 1, 2020.

But it hasn’t been for lack of trying. Swayman tried to get Joseph Woll of the Toronto Maple Leafs to fight on March 7, 2024, but Woll declined.

Officials also stepped in to keep St. Louis’ Jordan Binnington and Minnesota’s Marc-Andre Fleury from fighting in March 2023. Binnington was ejected and received a two-game suspension for throwing a punch at Wild forward Ryan Hartman.

For Hiller, it’s easy to understand why he didn’t want Kuemper to put his body at risk. The Kings have the best home record in the NHL at 25-3-4, and Kuemper has not lost in regulation in his past 14 home starts since Dec. 7.

While fans in the arena and on social media were disappointed the brawl never happened, Hiller was happy the goalies were intercepted in time.

“They’re not as agile as the players are, so I think it’s a little easier for the referees to get a hold of those guys, and glad they did,” Hiller said.

WASHINGTON — Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals became the first NHL team to clinch a playoff spot this season, doing so after winning in their 69th game and getting the help they needed elsewhere around the league.

They are the only team since the playoffs expanded to 16 teams in 1979-80 to be the first to clinch after being the last to get in the previous season.

“Our goal was to make the playoffs this year,” Ovechkin said after scoring his 888th career goal to help beat Philadelphia 3-2. “It’s hard. Every game, it’s hard, especially at the end because every team is fighting. That’s why in the beginning of the year and the middle of the year it’s very important to (be) collecting the points and feel comfortable at the end. Last year it took us 82 games to clinch it and since 20 games left last year, it was playoffs for us already. We take it and move on.”

Ovechkin, Tom Wilson, John Carlson and the core of the roster is still intact. Offseason acquisitions of center Pierre-Luc Dubois, wingers Andrew Mangiapane, Taylor Raddysh and Brandon Duhaime, defensemen Jakob Chychrun and Matt Roy and goaltender Logan Thompson all have worked as well as could be expected.

The Capitals are atop the NHL with 100 points, leading the Eastern Conference by 13 and cruising toward the playoffs.

“It’s been great,” Mangiapane said. “Obviously I think we have a really deep team: All four lines are great hockey players, the D pairings, all of them all make plays and our two goalies in net have been awesome. It’s a really deep team, and that’s why I think we’ve been consistent throughout the whole year. Any given day any player could step up and make great plays to help us win games.”

WASHINGTON — Alex Ovechkin has scored his 888th career goal to move seven away from breaking Wayne Gretzky’s NHL career record.

Ovechkin scored in the Washington Capitals’ home game against the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday night, beating Samuel Ersson with 5:35 left in the first period. The goal counter in the corner of the arena flipped to 888, and fans chanted “Ovi! Ovi!”

The 39-year-old winger now has 35 goals this season, tied for the fourth most in the league. Ovechkin at his current pace has a chance to to pass Gretzky’s legendary 894-goal mark, which was long considered unapproachable, later this spring.

The Capitals have 13 games left in the regular season before starting the playoffs. Ovechkin has one year left on his current contract in case he does not get there this season.

MANALAPAN, Fla. — The Country Music Association Awards ceremony kicks the Nashville Predators out of their arena for a long stretch every November. This year, they'll use that absence to travel to Sweden.

The NHL announced Tuesday the Predators are facing the Pittsburgh Penguins in regular-season games in Stockholm on Nov. 14 and 16 as part of the league's Global Series.

“I think it’ll be a good event for us,” Predators general manager Barry Trotz told The Associated Press. “We’re either going on a long trip out West or we can go to Europe.”

The games at newly renovated Avicii Arena are set to be the 47th and 48th games the league has held in Sweden and make it the 15th season with regular-season action outside North America.

The visit is perhaps one last chance for aging Pittsburgh captain Sidney Crosby and Swedish defenseman Erik Karlsson to play in Scandinavia. The Predators have a prominent Swede in top-line winger Filip Forsberg, with starting goaltender Juuse Saros hailing from neighboring Finland.

“It's going to be really fitting for us,” Trotz said after a session at the NHL GMs meeting in South Florida. “Not only we have some Swedish players - a guy like a Filip and a couple others that are really proud that they will go back and showcase their country, and I think Filip’s going to try to showcase his hometown. I think for our players, there’s not a better learning environment than travel and going to another country to learn more about the culture and understanding of that.”

The Penguins have not played in Europe since 2008, fresh off winning the third Stanley Cup championship in franchise history. They have since won it twice more, in 2016 and '17.

For Trotz, it will be a return overseas a quarter-century after he coached Nashville against Pittsburgh for two-season opening games in Saitama, Japan, in 2000. He wants his players to look forward to and enjoy the trip while also appreciating they will be meaningful games.

“You’ll have the excitement of the start of the season and then you get into November and it starts to get into a little bit of the grind,” Trotz said. “It might be a really good thing for us just to focus on that. But we’ve got to focus on it’s not a vacation.”

The NHL is returning to Sweden for the first time since 2023 after staging games in Finland and Czechia this season. Stockholm has hosted more NHL games than any other European city.

Predators CEO Sean Henry said being selected to participate in a marquee event like this is a testament to the organization’s support at home and abroad.

“This event will be particularly special for Filip Forsberg, who adores his home country, and the other Sweden natives on our team and in our organization,” Henry said in a statement. “We had such an incredible time with our fans at the 2022 Global Series in Bern and Prague, and we can’t wait for them to bring even more energy and enthusiasm in November.”