Page 22 - aruba-today-20190413

A22 sports
Saturday 13 april 2019
Capitals jump out to early lead,

hang on to beat Hurricanes

series 4-2 on Thursday night. low Washington to take a through the first on a pass
Backstrom scored twice 1-0 series lead. Game 2 is from Brad Marchand.
and Ovechkin scored on Saturday in Washington. Game 2 is Saturday night in
the power play to fire up The Hurricanes were play- Boston.
a raucous sellout crowd ing their first playoff game FLAMES 4, AVALANCHE 0
in the first playoff game in since 2009 after ending the CALGARY, Alberta (AP) —
Washington since celebrat- league’s longest drought. Matthew Tkachuk scored
ing the franchise’s first title MAPLE LEAFS 4, BRUINS 1 twice, Mike Smith made 26
in June. Defenseman John BOSTON (AP) — Mitch saves for his first playoff shut-
Carlson tied an NHL playoff Marner scored twice, the out in nearly seven years,
record with three assists in second on a short-handed and the Flames blanked
one period. Lars Eller sealed penalty shot to give Toron- the Colorado Avalanche in
with an empty-netter with to the lead for good, and Game 1 of their first-round
36.6 seconds left. Toronto won the opener of Western Conference play-
It looked as though the the first-round playoff series. off series.
Capitals would roll toward It was the Maple Leafs’ first Rookie Andrew Mangiap-
a statement victory against postseason penalty shot in ane and Mikael Backlund
an opponent lacking play- 20 years. also scored as Calgary
off experience, but the pes- Frederik Andersen made won its first playoff game
ky Hurricanes turned up the 37 saves and William Ny- since beating Anaheim 4-3
Toronto Maple Leafs goaltender Frederik Andersen makes a heat. Petr Mrazek bounced lander and John Tavares in overtime on May 5, 2015.
save during the first period of Game 1 of an NHL hockey first- back from a rough start to also scored for Toronto, The shutout was Smith’s first
round playoff series against the Boston Bruins, Thursday, April 11, make four huge saves early which swiped the home- in the postseason since May
2019 in Boston. in the third period, while ice advantage in the best- 20, 2012, when he made 36
Associated Press Svechnikov scored twice of-seven series as it tries to stops while with the Phoenix
By The Associated Press fending Stanley Cup cham- in his playoff debut to put advance through Boston Coyotes to shut out the Los
WASHINGTON (AP) — Nick- pion Washington Capitals some fear into the Capitals. for the first time in six tries. Angeles Kings in Game 4 of
las Backstrom and Alex survived a surge from An- Braden Holtby made 27 Tuukka Rask stopped 29 the Western Conference fi-
Ovechkin combined to drei Svechnikov and the saves and the penalty kill shots for Boston, and Pa- nal.
score three goals on the Carolina Hurricanes to win came up big on two late trice Bergeron scored a Game 2 is Saturday night in
first eight shots, and the de- Game 1 of their first-round Carolina power plays to al- power-play goal midway Calgary.q

Custer pulls away to win NASCAR Xfinity race at Richmond

By HANK KURZ Jr. ing that rain in the forecast with four laps to go in the
AP Sports Writer and on the radar might ar- stage.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — rive in time to shorten the Custer led 122 laps and All-
Cole Custer was openly race with him in the lead. gaier led 86.
hoping for rain to shorten By NASCAR rules, if the first “The pit call that we made
the NASCAR Xfinity race at two stages of a race are at the end of the (second)
Richmond Raceway on Fri- complete, the race is offi- stage, it worked out ob-
day night. cial. viously in our favor, but I
Then, he was desperately But while some rain came, pushed really hard to try
hoping for the rain to stay it was not enough to cause to get back up to the front
away. the race to be stopped. and just didn’t have quite
Custer passed Austin Cin- “It was so frustrating. They enough there are the end
dric with 20 laps to go and kept telling me it was 20 to do anything,” Allgaier
earned his second victory laps away,” Custer said of said.
of the season. the rain. “It never came. ... The race was especially
“At that last restart, I tried This one means a lot. We hard on Christopher Bell,
something a little bit differ- haven’t had a short track who was running near the
ent and it didn’t work out. I win yet. We’ve struggled a front in search of his second
knew I had like 25 laps, but lot at short tracks. This helps. consecutive victory when
then it started raining a little This definitely means a lot.” he spun, bringing out a
bit and I was like, ‘Man, we Cindric said he had some caution 10 laps before the
might not even make it to Cole Custer, right, holds the trophy along with track president raindrops on his wind- end of the second stage.
Dennis Bickmeier, as he celebrates winning the NASCAR Xfinity
the end so I have to get by Series auto race at Richmond Raceway in Richmond, Va., shield after he took the Stopping for repairs put Bell
quick here,’” Custer said. Friday, April 12, 2019. lead and “I turned into the back to 16th position, but
Cindric had grabbed the Associated Press most religious person you’ll when the race went green
lead on a restart with 25 laps finishers in this race will be Sieg. ever know praying for it to with 90 laps to go, he very
to go, but Custer regained eligible for the bonus when Allgaier had the lead un- downpour.” quickly worked his way into
the lead five laps later and the series races next at Tal- til Custer passed him on Allgaier started seventh but contention, running third
pulled away for his second ladega Superspeedway in the inside after he pitted worked his way to the front behind Custer and Allgaier.
victory of the season. The two weeks. for tires under a green flag to win the 75-lap first stage, But when David Starr spun
victory also earned Custer Justin Allgaier dominated and Allgaier opted to stay his third stage victory in the with under 40 laps to go
a $100,000 bonus as the top the first half of the race out. It was a calculated risk last two races. Custer won and everyone pitted, Bell
finisher among four drivers and finished third, followed for Allgaier, who won the the second stage when he dropped from third to 10th.
who qualified. The top four by Tyler Reddick and Ryan first stage and was hop- pulled away on a restart He finished 16th.q