DALLAS (AP) Jamie Benn scored two goals to give him a career-best 36 this season, and the Dallas Stars took sole possession of first place in the Western Conference by rallying for a 4-3 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Thursday night.
J. Benn: 29th career multi-goal game passes Joe Nieuwendyk & Jere Lehtinen for 2nd most in DAL #Stars history (1993-). Mike Modano tops (72)
Benn's winning goal 11:50 into the third period came about 2 minutes after Stephen Johns' first NHL goal as the Stars dropped the Lightning to 31-2-0 when leading after two periods.
Dallas (93 points) is two points ahead of St. Louis atop the West. Both teams have 10 games remaining.
Steven Stamkos had two goals for the Lightning (85 points), who stayed in third in the Atlantic Division and fell four points behind division-leading Florida, a 4-1 winner at Toronto.
DALLAS - Jamie Benn scored two goals to give him a career-best 36 this season, and the Dallas Stars took sole possession of first place in the Western Conference by rallying for a 4-3 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Thursday night.
Be...
ERIE, Pa. - Alex DeBrincat and Dylan Strome each had a goal and two assists as the league-leading Erie Otters downed the Owen Sound Attack 6-2 in Ontario Hockey League action Thursday.
Strome's three points gave him 106 on the season and move...
PITTSBURGH, Pa. - Sidney Crosby scored a pair of highlight-reel goals and the Pittsburgh Penguins rallied past the Carolina Hurricanes 4-2 on Thursday night for their fourth straight victory.
Crosby beat Eddie Lack with a slick backhander in ...
His second goal of the game would hold up as the game-winner, and was just the latest out of Crosby's book of tricks, with the Penguins captain dropping to one knee.
For Crosby, his goals helped him extend his current point streak to 10 games - the longest active streak in the league - while also helping his club rebound from a 2-0 first-period deficit.
With the win, the Penguins have a three-point cushion over the Detroit Red Wings for the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference and sit just one point behind the New York Islanders for third place in the Metropolitan Division.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - James Neal and Ryan Johansen each scored a goal and added an assist to lead the Nashville Predators to a 4-2 win over the New York Islanders on Thursday night.
Ryan Ellis and Austin Watson also scored for Nashville, which h...
TORONTO - Jussi Jokinen scored two strange goals to help the Florida Panthers to a 4-1 win in Toronto on Thursday night, further solidifying their Atlantic Division lead.
Jokinen wasn't attempting to score on either goal against the Maple Lea...
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Henrik Zetterberg and Darren Helm scored in the third period to lead the Detroit Red Wings to a 3-1 victory over the Columbus Blue Jackets on Thursday night.
Luke Glendening also scored and Jimmy Howard stopped 27 shots as De...
Reid Boucher also scored, Tyler Kennedy added a season-high three assists and Keith Kinkaid made 28 saves as New Jersey snapped a three-game home losing streak and rebounded from a 7-1 disaster in Anaheim on Monday.
First three-point game for Tyler Kennedy since Nov. 25, 2011 vs. Ott. (1g-2a).
Nino Niederreiter, Jared Spurgeon, Justin Fontaine and Mikko Koivu scored for the Wild, who squandered a chance to move ahead of Colorado into the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference with a too-little, too-late effort in losing their second straight.
This one was never in doubt. Smith-Pelly and Sislo scored in the opening 1:34 and New Jersey hit the net three times on their first eight shots against Devan Dubnyk, sending him to the bench late in the opening period.
Backup Darcy Kuemper didn't fare much better. He gave up a goal on the first shot he faced, an uncontested shot in close by Smith-Pelly early in the second for a 4-1 lead.
New Jersey, which only took 25 shots, dominated the Wild in close with five of the first six goals being tallied either in the crease or on the edge of it. The exception was Sislo's second NHL goal, which came from the top of the right circle for a 6-2 lead in the second period.
That goal capped another outburst with Henrique and Sislo, who missed practice on Wednesday because of an illness, scoring 38 seconds apart.
Smith-Pelly, who has six goals and three assists in seven games since being acquired from Montreal, and Sislo, who had not scored in his first 32 NHL games, tallied 51 seconds apart to stake New Jersey to a 2-0 lead.
It was the fastest two goals to start a game for New Jersey since Randy McKay and Brian Rolston scored in the opening 1:13 against Philadelphia in 1998.
Niederreiter got his 17th of the season on a power play at 14:15, but Boucher pushed the margin to 3-1 three minutes later when Dubnyk could not control a point shot and Boucher shoved it into the net after Kennedy slid the puck across the crease.
Minnesota never got close again.
NOTES: The Devils' previous high was six goals against Ottawa on Jan. 21. ... Dubnyk was 5-1-1 with a 2.10 goals-against average in his last seven games. ... Ryan Suter broke the Wild single-season record for assists by a defenseman, picking up his 38th on Spurgeon's goal. ... Devils D Andy Greene played in his 300th consecutive game. ... Minnesota has power-play goals on the road in 14 of 15 games. ... New Jersey is now 3-5, wearing its red, white and green retro jerseys. ... The Devils finished their season against the Western Conference with a 16-11-1 record. They were 2-0 against Minnesota. ... It was Kennedy's first three-point game since 2011.