NHL Recap: Dallas Crushes San Jose, Washington Throttles Flordia

A huge night in the National Hockey League as 11 games — several with major playoff implications — heated up the ice. Let’s take a look at two of the biggest scorelines of the evening as we recap some of the action:

Dallas Stars 8, San Jose Sharks 2

Desperate to stay alive in the Western Conference playoff picture, the Dallas Stars made a major statement by beating up on the first-place team in the West. Led by four point nights from both Mike Ribeiro and Brenden Morrow (two goals and two assists each), Dallas rung up a season high eight goals and gave head coach Marc Crawford his 500th NHL win.

The scoreline might indicate that San Jose took the night off, but that’s not entirely true. San Jose peppered Dallas netminder Kari Lehtonen with 46 shots, including 19 in the second period. The only Sharks to beat Lehtonen were Dan Boyle (on the power play) and Devin Setoguchi, who scored in 17th of the season.

For Dallas, nearly everybody got in on the scoring. Brad Richards had a three-point night, Steve Ott and Brandon Segal both had a goal and an assist while Trevor Daley and Loui Eriksson had two assists each.

Washington Capitals 7, Florida Panthers 3

No Ovi? No problem.

In their first game without suspended captain Alexander Ovechkin, the Washington Capitals looked no worse for wear and thrashed the Florida Panthers in Sunrise.

Six different Caps got in on the scoring spree. Brooks Laich had two while Nicklas Backstrom, Eric Fehr, Brendan Morrison, Jason Chimera and Alex Semin all tallied singles. The most amazing part, however, is that the team continued to rack up goals despite playing without Ovechkin. Alex the Great has been suspended two games for a hit on Chicago’s Brian Campbell and this marked the fourth time that Ovechkin has been sidelined for a game against Florida this season. But, apparently, his presence doesn’t really seem to make a difference.

The Panthers have had a miserable season and this game only added to the misery. Starting netminder Tomas Vokoun was chased midway through the second period after allowing five goals on 21 shots; backup Scott Clemmensen fared a little better by only allowing two goals on 18 shots.

Florida goalscorers were Steven Reinprecht, Kamil Kreps and Michal Repik — it should be noted that Greg Campbell notched two assists in what was probably Florida’s best individual performance on the evening.

If you’d like to get in on all the NHL hockey betting options available as the chase for the playoffs continues, head on over to the Sports Interaction online sportsbook today!