Ovechkin arrives
Alex Ovechkin was bumped around, boxed in and, well, pretty much Broad Street Bullied for most of his NHL playoff debut in Washington.
Then, with the outcome hanging in the balance, Alex the Great emerged.
Held without a shot until late, the league’s leading scorer stole the puck and netted the tiebreaking goal with 4 1/2 minutes remaining, giving the Washington Capitals a 5-4 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers in Game 1 of their Eastern Conference first-round series Friday night.
“They held him in check pretty good,” Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau said, “but he’s one of the guys that needs one chance.”
That’s pretty much all Ovechkin got against the Flyers, who led 4-2 heading into the final period, thanks to two goals apiece by Danny Briere and Vaclav Prospal. But Ovechkin got going by helping set up the first of two goals by defenseman Mike Green that lifted Washington into a tie.
Penguins 5, Senators 3: At Pittsburgh, Ryan Malone scored the Penguins’ third power-play goal of the game with only 1:02 left and added an empty-net goal in a victory over Ottawa to sweep the first two home games in the Eastern Conference playoff series. Pittsburgh had squandered a three-goal lead.
Malone added an empty-net goal with 6.5 seconds remaining – the Penguins’ 54th shot, their most in regulation in their playoff history.
Rangers 2, Devils 1: At Newark, N.J., Jaromir Jagr and Sean Avery scored 23 seconds apart in the third period, and Henry Lundqvist made 26 saves in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals.
The victory gave New York a 2-0 lead in the best-of-7 series.
Wild 3, Avalanche 2 (OT): At St. Paul, Minn., Keith Carney scored on a slap shot 14 seconds into overtime to lift the Wild to a victory over Colorado, tying the series 1-1 and giving a huge sigh of relief to more than 19,000 fans.
Milan Hejduk tied it for the Avalanche with 43.8 seconds left in regulation.
Around the league
The Edmonton Oilers signed defenseman Tom Gilbert to a six-year, $24 million contract. … Nashville Predators forward Scott Nichol broke his left thumb in Game 1 against Detroit and was scheduled to have surgery Friday. … Jacques Martin will no longer coach the Florida Panthers and has been offered the chance to concentrate on his front-office duties as general manager.