Forsberg, Flyers pick up first win
The Philadelphia Flyers needed only three days to get back at the New York Rangers.
Flyers captain Peter Forsberg had a goal and two assists, and Antero Niittymaki made 25 saves as Philadelphia beat New York, 4-2, last night at Madison Square Garden for its first win of the season.
``This was a huge win for us," said Niittymaki, who lost a 13-round shootout to the Rangers at home Saturday.
The Flyers returned the favor and handed the Rangers their first loss.
``We wanted to show that we wanted to win tonight," Forsberg said. ``We know these are big games. We have to battle these guys all year."
In the rematch, Simon Gagne tipped Forsberg's right-circle feed under Henrik Lundqvist's pads on a 5-on-3 power play for his third goal of the season at 12:25 of the second period that made it 4-1.
New Rangers forward Brendan Shanahan scored his third of the season with 29 seconds left in the middle period. He fired in a hard slap shot off a nice feed from Michael Nylander during a power play to close the gap to 4-2.
It was the first power-play goal of the season for the Rangers.
``Obviously, our effort wasn't good enough and we know that," Shanahan said. ``They came out as a team that deserved to win and expected to win. We came out like a team waiting to see what they were going to do. We were spectators the first two periods."
Philadelphia scored twice within 59 seconds of the second period to take a 3-1 lead. Mike Knuble scored his first at 6:59, skating out unchecked from the right corner and deking Lundqvist on a backhander from close range. Geoff Sanderson followed at 7:58, scoring on a 2-on-1 break for his second of the season.
Wild 2, Canucks 1 -- Manny Fernandez made 30 saves, and Petteri Nummelin beat Roberto Luongo with a nifty double-move backhander in the shootout to lift host Minnesota past Vancouver.
Fernandez stopped two of the four shots he faced in the shootout, and the Wild made Luongo look silly after he was stellar in regulation. Luongo made 34 saves before the tiebreaker, including a brilliant game-saving stop on a breakaway by Todd White in overtime.
But Mikko Koivu beat him in the second round of the shootout, and after Jan Bulis fired a shot into Fernandez's pads, Nummelin came in slowly, hesitated and lifted a backhander over Luongo's glove to win it.
Luongo saved just one of four shots in the shootout, while Markus Naslund and Brendan Morrison scored for the Canucks.
Kings 4, Islanders 2 -- Brent Sopel scored the go-ahead goal on a power play with 6 seconds left in the second period and Alexander Frolov added a power-play goal with 17 seconds left in the game to lead host Los Angeles.
