NHL ROUNDUP : Lemieux Scores His 35th Hat Trick

Playing catch-up on the road is not the way to win. Not against Mario Lemieux and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Lemieux had his 35th career hat trick and fourth this season as he raised his NHL-leading goal total to 34 in the Penguins’ 6-5 victory over the Florida Panthers on Saturday night.

Lemieux scored the first of his three goals 36 seconds into the game and the Penguins scored four times in the first 7:04, then held on to win at Pittsburgh.

“We dominated the last 55 minutes,” Florida Coach Doug MacLean said. “You can’t get down 4-0 to a team like that and expect to beat them.”

The Panthers started the game with a 13-4 disadvantage in shots, then went on to hold a 39-16 edge from there. They outscored Pittsburgh, 5-2, in the last 40 minutes. But not even a three-goal third period was enough.

“We got off to a terrible start,” Florida forward Scott Mellanby said. “We can’t kid ourselves because we came back.”

The Panthers came into the game with a 2.37 goals against average, second only to Detroit.

Toronto 4, St. Louis 3--Mats Sundin scored six seconds into overtime to give the Maple Leafs a come-from-behind victory at St. Louis. Toronto’s Paul DiPietro tied the score with 12:19 left in regulation and gave his team a chance to gain a victory.

The Blues won the faceoff to begin the overtime, but Sundin ended up with the puck in front of the goal and fired it between goalie Grant Fuhr’s pads.

Washington 3, Hartford 0--Jim Carey stopped 26 shots for his second shutout in three starts and the Capitals extended the Whalers’ winless streak to seven games with a victory at Landover, Md.

Keith Jones had two goals and an assist for Washington, which has won five in a row at home for the first time since February 1992.

Montreal 4, Ottawa 1--In their next-to-last game at the Ottawa Civic Center and perhaps their final game of the year without Alexei Yashin, the Senators lost because they could not convert the power play.

Yashin, who ended his season-long holdout Saturday and signed a five-year contract with the Senators, did not suit up for the game. Ottawa missed him on the power play, failing on seven of eight opportunities with its lone goal coming on a freak deflection.

N.Y. Rangers 8 Edmonton 3--Adam Graves scored two goals and the Rangers erupted for five goals in the first period to extend their unbeaten streak to six games.

New York is 5-0-1 in its last six games, outscoring its opponents, 24-12. The Rangers have won three in a row on the road to open a four-point lead over Florida in the Atlantic Division.