NHL ROUNDUP : Rangers Rally, Beat North Stars

The slumping New York Rangers seemed on their way to another defeat Friday night at New York. They trailed the Minnesota North Stars, 4-1, with 12 minutes left.

But the Rangers, thoroughly outplayed, turned it around and Mark Messier climaxed a rally that gave them a 5-4 victory.

After Brian Leetch and Doug Weight scored the goals that brought the Rangers back into the game, Messier scored goals less than two minutes apart to end a four-game winless streak.

At 14:04, Messier, set up by Adam Graves, scored his 28th goal to tie the score.

On his next shift, 99 seconds later, Messier knocked in a rebound to spoil a strong performance by Jon Casey.

Until the Rangers started their comeback, Casey had faced 31 shots and stopped 30 of them. But his teammates seemed to tire and the Rangers swarmed all over the goaltender.

By running their record to 38-20-4, the Rangers, who had been 0-3-1 in their previous four games, became the first NHL team to get 80 points.

Winnipeg 6, New Jersey 4--The Jets, beaten at home by St. Louis Wednesday, fell behind, 2-1, to the Devils at Winnipeg.

But Pat Elynuik led a rally that brought the Jets even, 4-4. With his second goal of the night, he broke the tie halfway through the third period.

The Devils continued to battle for a tie until Troy Murray scored into an empty net with five seconds remaining.

Winnipeg Coach John Paddock said: “We didn’t make very smart plays out there, but a lot of them didn’t cost us.”

Boston 5, Edmonton 3--Adam Oates had a goal and two assists at Edmonton to help the Bruins build a 5-0 lead in two periods.

The goal was Oates’ first since being traded to the Bruins by the St. Louis Blues for Craig Janney earlier this month.

The Oilers, who had only 11 shots in the first two periods against former teammate Andy Moog, scored three times on 10 shots in the last period.

Vancouver 5, San Jose 3--Pavel Bure’s second goal of the game broke a third-period tie as the Canucks rallied at Daly City, Calif., to break a five-game winless streak on the road. The Sharks have lost six in a row.