Ovechkin helps Capitals avoid elimination

TORONTO — Alex Ovechkin scored twice, including the go-ahead goal early in the third period, as the Washington Capitals rallied from two goals down to beat the New York Islanders 3-2 Tuesday night and avoid a sweep in their first-round series.

Evgeny Kuznetsov also scored for the Capitals and Braden Holtby stopped 24 shots. Washington won for the second time in seven post-season games, going 1-1-1 in round-robin play in the qualifying round to fall to the No. 3 seed in the Eastern Conference, and then losing the first three games against the Islanders.

Mathew Barzal and Jean-Gabriel Pageau scored in the first period to give New York a 2-0 lead. Semyon Varlamov finished with 26 saves. The Islanders lost for the second time in eight games this post-season.

Game 5 is Thursday.

FLYERS 2, CANADIENS 0

Carter Hart stopped 29 shots for his second straight shutout, Michael Raffl and Phil Myers each scored and Philadelphia took a 3-1 lead in the Eastern Conference playoff series.

The top-seeded Flyers can wrap up the series in Game 5 on Wednesday. The Flyers haven’t advanced to the second round of the playoffs since 2012, made the Stanley Cup Final since 2010 or won it all since 1975.

It’s the fifth time in NHL history a goalie had back-to-back post-season shutouts before age 23 and the first since Felix Potvin in 1994.

Montreal’s Carey Price finished with 20 saves.

STARS 2, FLAMES 1

EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — John Klingberg scored his first goal since the NHL’s restart early in the third period, and Dallas held on to take a 3-2 lead in the Western Conference playoff series.

Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin teamed up for the first goal for the Stars, who can reach the conference semifinals for the second straight year with a victory in Game 6 on Thursday. It’s been 19 years since the Stars won playoff series in consecutive seasons.

Klingberg’s go-ahead goal came two days after he was initially credited with the overtime goal in a 5-4 win that evened the series. But his hard shot grazed Alexander Radulov’s stick, and the Russian was eventually credited with the winner.

Anton Khudobin made 28 stops, including a glove save on a good look for Erik Gustafsson in the final two minutes before the Flames called timeout and pulled Cam Talbot.

Mikael Backlund scored for Calgary, and Talbot had 30 saves.

GOLDEN KNIGHTS 4, BLACKHAWKS 3

EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Alex Tuch scored the tiebreaking goal 1:34 into the third period, and Vegas advanced to the conference semifinals.

Vegas, the top-seed in the Western Conference, became the first team in the Stanley Cup playoffs to advance to the conference semis. The Golden Knights will face the lowest remaining seed in the next round.

Max Pacioretty scored in the closing seconds of the first period and Mark Stone scored less than a minute into the second as the Golden Knights quickly erased Chicago’s early 2-0 advantage. Alec Martinez scored on a power play midway through the second period after Patrick Kane had given Chicago a 3-2 lead.

Robin Lehner made 23 saves including a couple of big stops in the closing seconds, and improved to 8-1 since being acquired by the Golden Knights from Chicago back in February.

Jonathan Toews scored his fifth of the post-season and Alex DeBrincat scored at 18:19 of the first to give the Blackhawks a 2-0 lead.

Corey Crawford made 35 saves.

The Associated Press