Patrik Laine scored in overtime to give the host Montreal Canadiens a thrilling 5-4 victory over the New York Rangers on Sunday.
Brendan Gallagher and Christian Dvorak both collected one goal and one assist, while Nick Suzuki and Juraj Slafkovsky added singles for the Canadiens, who erased four deficits en route to the victory.
Rookie goaltender Jakub Dobes made 23 saves to earn his fifth win in as many career starts.
Amidst the back-and-forth action, Laine drove to the net and redirected a pass from Kaiden Guhle at 3:20 of overtime for his 12th goal in 18 games this season.
Defenseman Lane Hutson, who leads all rookies in scoring, collected one assist to run his point streak to eight games, in which he has collected one goal and 11 assists.
Montreal is on a 12-3-1 run to pull within one point of the Eastern Conference’s second wild-card position.
Alexis Lafreniere, Will Cuylle, Mika Zibanejad and Chris Kreider replied for the Rangers, who received a 33-save performance from goalie Jonathan Quick. Defenseman Adam Fox netted a pair of assists.
New York has earned points in eight consecutive games (5-0-3).
Lafreniere opened the scoring at the 11:17 mark when he pounced on a loose puck in front of the net, but Gallagher tied the clash at 13:52 by deflecting Dvorak’s long shot.
Cuylle put the Rangers ahead again 46 seconds later by taking advantage of an errant clearing attempt that came to him in the slot, only for Dvorak to tie the count at 5:07 of the second period by burying a chance off the rush for the power-play goal.
Zibanejad made it a 3-2 game at 10:24 of the second period with a power-play goal of his own, a seeing-eye long wrist shot, only for Suzuki to even the game a third time at 15:05 of the back-and-forth frame when he intercepted a cleaning attempt and whistled home a shot from the slot.
Only 75 seconds later, Kreider redirected a crossing pass from Fox to finish a wild flurry and put the Rangers ahead 4-3 at 16:20 of the third period. However, Slafkovsky tied the clash at 12:52 of the third period by driving the net for a rebound chance.
