Detroit’s Draper Lowers Curtains On Top of Blues

Kris Draper’s tie-breaking goal with 2:06 left Tuesday night helped the Detroit Red Wings to a 5-3 victory over the St. Louis Blues and moved the Red Wings back into a tie for the Western Conference lead at Detroit.

Draper beat St. Louis goalie Grant Fuhr to finish off a three-man break with Larry Murphy and Steve Yzerman. The goal came just 2:56 after Sylvain Turgeon scored for the Blues to forge a 3-3 tie.

“We need contributions from all of us,” Draper said. “It seems like when we’ve had problems we’ve been relying on one guy or one line to get us going. We need scoring from all different areas.”

The Red Wings got it Tuesday as Kirk Maltby, Vyacheslav Kozlov, Martin Lapointe and Yzerman also had goals. Yzerman’s empty-net goal with 1:13 remaining clinched Detroit’s fourth consecutive win and ended St. Louis’ five-game winning streak.

Dmitri Mironov and Doug Brown both had two assists for Detroit.

Detroit and Dallas have 99 points. The Red Wings have five games remaining in the regular season while the Stars have six. The Stars are currently the conference’s top-seeded team because they have two more wins than the Red Wings.

“We’re doing a little scoreboard watching,” Draper said. “We just want to keep winning hockey games, and if that happens it could be interesting at the end.”

Al MacInnis had a goal and an assist for the Blues and became only the sixth defenseman in NHL history with 1,000 points.

Montreal 3, New York Rangers 2--Scott Thornton and Patrice Brisebois scored 27 seconds apart in the second period to lead the Canadiens at New York.

Thornton scored his sixth goal of the season on a power play at 10:55 when he lifted his own rebound over Ranger goaltender Mike Richter.

Toronto 3, Florida 1--Mats Sundin scored his 31st goal as the Maple Leafs kept their slim playoff hopes alive with a victory at Miami.

The victory, only the third in the last 12 games for the Maple Leafs, kept them within reach of a playoff spot. The Maple Leafs are nine points behind in the battle for the final position in the Western Conference with five games remaining.

Phoenix 2, Pittsburgh 1--Rick Tocchet knocked in a centering pass from Cliff Ronning at 15:19 of the third period to give the Coyotes the victory at Pittsburgh.

The victory moved the Coyotes into sole possession of sixth place in the Western Conference race for a playoff spot with 74 points.

Boston 4, Ottawa 2--Steve Heinze scored three consecutive goals to power the Bruins to victory at Kanata, Canada.

Heinze scored his 19th and 20th goals in the first period and added his 21st in the second.

San Jose 6, Calgary 0--Mike Vernon and Kelly Hrudey teamed up for a shutout as the Sharks routed the Flames at San Jose.

NHL Notes

Center Petr Nedved, holding out from the Pittsburgh Penguins, signed a contract to play for the Las Vegas Thunder of the International Hockey League. The 26-year-old Nedved nearly signed with the Thunder last month, but chose instead to join a team in his native Czech Republic. Nedved signed with the Thunder once the Czech team was eliminated from the playoffs. . . . Montreal Canadien center Saku Koivu will be sidelined for at least two weeks because of a broken finger on his left hand. Koivu, 23, was injured when he was slashed by Washington’s Stewart Malgunas.