The three-game sweep of the NHL schedule from Saturday starts in Calgary, where the Flames rediscovered their complete game effort in a 5-2 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Johnny Gaudreau scored twice for the Flames.
“I think we didn’t start out the way we wanted to, but we’ve been working hard in practices and trying to figure out what we’ve been doing wrong,” Gaudreau said. “I think we’ve been limiting our turnovers, just playing a lot better defensively, which is leading to more offense. I think that’s what’s happening right now.
“We played well defensively. We played well offensively. Everyone showed up tonight to play three great periods. It’s just exciting to be in this locker room after a game like that.”
Sam Bennett, Sean Monahan and Joe Colborne also scored for Calgary.
“Every team has back-to-backs,” Pittsburgh’s Eric Fehr said. “We’ve caught teams on the tail end of back-to-backs and they play hard. It is a tough trip coming out to Western Canada, but we’ve still got to battle.”
Karri Ramo made 23 saves for the win; Marc-Andre Fleury had 26 saves in the loss.
“It was huge for us to get those two wins here at home and get some back-to-back wins there,” Gaudreau said. “We have a huge trip coming up. We’re excited, and we have to get right after it the next game.”
In Glendale, Antti Raanta was less than five seconds from picking up his second shutout of the season with the New York Rangers.
But the Arizona Coyotes’ Shane Doan scored a power play goal to end the scoring with the Rangers skating off with a 4-1 win.
“I lost all my road games last year, so I really didn’t care about the shutout,” Raanta said. “The shutout is always a bonus, but there was lots of luck today and lots of chances. They probably deserved that one goal.”
Raanta and Henrik Lundqvist have been superb in the Rangers net and are the main reason the club is doing as well as it is in the standings; all that despite the anemic offense the team puts out every night.
“I felt really good in training camp, and working with our goalie coach [Benoit Allaire], every day is a good day because he’s always in a good mood,” Raanta said. “I just try to do my thing whenever I get to play a game. It’s worked so far.”
Jesper Fast, J.T. Miller, Chris Kreider, and Kevin Hayes scored for New York.
“We put ourselves in trouble two or three times tonight. We didn’t execute well enough,” Arizona coach Dave Tippett said. “If you look deep into the game, there are some things that we have to do much better.”
In St Paul, Devan Dubnyk made 31 saves and the Wild shutout the Tampa Bay Lightning, 1-0.
“It’s nice to be able to pay these guys back,” Dubnyk said. “They’ve scored four or five goals for me in some wins this year. They worked real hard for me tonight and gave me a chance.”
It was a return to form for Dubnyk who has not been the same goalie as last season.
“I felt good on my blades and I felt pretty patient,” Dubnyk said. “That’s the most important part of my game.”
Jared Spurgeon‘s second period goal was all that Dubnyk needed for the win.
“The frustration is not out of a lack of scoring chances, a lack of effort, a lack of all the things you look for. The frustration is out of, I’m confused,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “We’re going through these games and we’re considerably outchancing teams, I thought we outchanced them tonight. And they get the one [goal] and for whatever reason, we can’t find a way to get one.
“The guys are doing all the right things, they’re doing everything you ask of them. They’re not going in. We sit here and say ‘Eventually, it’s going to end.’ But it’s going on a lot longer than I anticipated.”
Ben Bishop made 24 saves in the loss.
“Everybody chipped in. It takes five guys to shut down top players,” Wild defenseman Ryan Suter said. “He showed what he was capable of last year, and tonight he definitely showed it.”
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