St. Paul, Minn. — The Minnesota Wild's power-play unit continues to be the team's unlikely savior.
Andrew Brunette and Lubomir Sekeras scored power-play goals during a five-minute span in the first period to lead the Wild to a 2-1 victory over the Nashville Predators on Friday night.
Manny Fernandez made 19 saves for Minnesota, which entered the game 0-for-30 on the power play against Nashville. The Wild had the NHL's worst special teams unit last season.
"We're just bulldozing along on the power play," Brunette said. "Teams are bearing down and making adjustments to stop us, but we're still moving the puck pretty well. And we really clicked for a while tonight."
Greg Johnson scored for Nashville, which fell to 5-12-2-0 on the road.
Brunette, Minnesota's leading scorer, took his own rebound and shot from behind the goal line. With Predators goaltender Mike Dunham scrambling to recover from the initial shot, Brunette banked a low shot off Dunham's blocker hand and in to make it 1-0 at 8:53.
Sekeras' shot from the top of the right circle found its way through a crowd and past Dunham to give Minnesota a 2-0 lead at 13:19.
Blackhawks 2,
Lightning 0
Chicago Jocelyn Thibault stopped 17 shots for his third shutout of the season as Chicago beat Tampa Bay for its fifth straight victory.
Mike Peluso and Tony Amonte scored for the Blackhawks, whose winning streak is their longest since they won six straight to close the 1998-99 season.
Nikolai Khabibulin made 27 saves for the Lightning, who lost their fifth consecutive game and were shut out for the second straight contest.
Tampa Bay, the NHL's second-lowest scoring team, has gone 127 minutes, 34 seconds without a goal.
Panthers 2,
Mighty Ducks 1
Anaheim, Calif. Rookie Kristian Huselius scored the go-ahead goal with 10:49 remaining, and Pavel Bure had a goal and an assist as Florida beat Anaheim. Olli Jokinen had two assists, and Roberto Luongo made 26 saves for the Panthers, who are 7-6-1 since Mike Keenan replaced Duane Sutter as coach on Dec. 3.
They already have one more victory under Keenan than they did in 26 games this season under Sutter.
A couple of hours after hearing about the resignation of team chairman Tony Tavares, who had been with the organization since it entered the NHL nine seasons ago, the Ducks lost their fourth straight following a season-high four-game unbeaten streak. Jeff Friesen scored Anaheim's goal.
The Ducks, returning from their second six-game road trip of the season, are 2-8-2 in their last 12 home games. The Panthers have beaten them in five of their last six meetings, including a 6-0 romp on Nov. 21 in Florida.
Jokinen was about to be assessed a cross-checking penalty when Friesen opened the scoring with his 10th goal, converting a rebound of Pavel Trnka's attempt from the edge of the crease at 7:36 of the second period.
The Panthers killed off the ensuing power play, then tied the score at 13:33 of the period when Bure beat Jean-Sebastien Giguere to the glove side on a 40-foot slap shot from the slot with the teams skating 4-on-4.
It was Bure's third goal in four games, matching the total he had over his previous 15 contests. Bure, who led the NHL in goals in each of the previous two seasons and has scored at least 50 five times, needs four more to extend his career total to 400.
Giguere, who had the league's best goals-against (1.43) and save percentage (.946) during December, made 25 saves in his first start of the new year. Two other Florida shots hit goalposts one by Niklas Hagman with 9:02 left in the first, the other by Darren Van Impe during a power play with 9:33 left in the second.
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