Penguins snap skid, top Bruins in OT, 6-5

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Pascal Dupuis scored his second goal of the game 1:24 into overtime and the Pittsburgh Penguins welcomed back star forward Evgeni Malkin by snapping their four-game losing streak with a 6-5 win over the Boston Bruins on Saturday night.

Malkin, the reigning NHL scoring champion, had three assists in his return to the lineup after he missed seven games because of a shoulder injury.

Dupuis scored when goalie Tim Thomas mistakenly left a puck along the boards. Pittsburgh’s Jordan Staal picked it up and fed it to Dupuis, who tucked in his 100th NHL goal and fifth this season.

The Penguins’ Bill Guerin sent it to overtime when he scored with 0.4 seconds left in regulation off a feed from Malkin.

The Bruins, 2-0-3 in their past five, scored twice during the final 5:47 of regulation to take their only lead. David Krejci’s 5-on-3 goal tied it, and Marco Sturm put Boston ahead with 2:29 left.

Sidney Crosby had a goal and two assists, and Jay McKee and Mark Eaton also scored for the Penguins, who netted only three goals during their skid. Pittsburgh scored only once in the 209 minutes, 9 seconds before Saturday’s game.

The Bruins had scored 11 goals in their previous eight games and were shut out in their two previous road games.

This game turned into a shootout, capped by a frantic final 13 minutes in regulation and overtime.

Eaton gave the Penguins their fourth lead of the game when he finished a setup from Crosby with 11 minutes left in regulation.

Krejci’s second of the season came after Crosby was penalized for tripping soon after a 4-minute penalty was given to Pittsburgh’s Matt Cooke for high-sticking Byron Ritz.

About a minute after Boston tied it, Crosby had a breakaway but Thomas lunged to stop his backhanded shot.

That allowed Sturm to deflect in Zdeno Chara’s shot from the point past goalie Brent Johnson.

Blake Wheeler, Michael Ryder and Derek Morris also scored and Chara and former Penguins forward Mark Recchi had two assists for Boston, which had not scored a power-play goal in eight of its previous nine contests.

Eaton’s goal was his second of the season and 22nd in 472 NHL games. Just 1:42 in, McKee scored the 21st goal of his 760-game career to end Thomas’ shutout streak at 174:16 and the Bruins’ shutout run of 128:36.

The teams then alternated goals over the next 55 minutes.