Thrashers Cool Off Streaking Devils

As far as the Atlanta Thrashers are concerned, beating the New Jersey Devils was not a fluke.

Marc Savard scored into an open net after a bad bounce off the glass and Vyacheslav Kozlov added another goal 15 seconds later as the Thrashers beat New Jersey, 4-2, Friday night at East Rutherford, N.J., to hand the Devils their first loss in regulation since Jan. 4.

The loss ended New Jersey’s franchise record-tying eight-game winning streak and helped the Thrashers extend their club-record road winning streak to four games.

Defenseman Andy Sutton’s hard power-play dump-in led to Savard’s goal with 6 minutes 56 seconds remaining.

“With the partitions,” Sutton said, “you never know what kind of bounce you’re going to get.”

It certainly fooled Devil goaltender Martin Brodeur. He went behind his net to play the puck and was out of position when it bounced out in front to Savard.

Ilya Kovalchuk and Dan Snyder also scored, and Byron Dafoe made 26 saves in his first game since Jan. 13 as Atlanta improved to 7-2-1 since Bob Hartley took over as coach.

With their 19th victory, the Thrashers surpassed last season’s total.

They are 10 points out of the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Minnesota 4, San Jose 3 -- Cliff Ronning followed a disallowed goal early in the third period with one that counted 45 seconds later and the Wild won at St. Paul, Minn. The Wild began the day sixth in the Western Conference and recorded its 27th victory -- more than each of its first two seasons.

Teemu Selanne had a goal and an assist for the Sharks, who lost for only the second time in six games.

Washington 3, New York Islanders 0 -- Olaf Kolzig made 20 saves to anchor a suffocating defense for the Capitals at Washington. The Islanders had only two shots for the first 19 minutes of the opening period and needed nearly 13 minutes to get their first shot in the second.

Calgary 4, Edmonton 3 -- Jarome Iginla scored his third goal of the game with 1:08 remaining to lift the Flames at Edmonton, Canada. Iginla also scored the tying goal about five minutes earlier.

Vancouver 4, Buffalo 2 -- Markus Naslund scored his NHL-leading 36th goal and added an assist to help the Canucks win at Buffalo, N.Y. Naslund faked several times and then put a backhand shot on a breakaway past Martin Biron to make it 2-0.