Double delight for Ovechkin

The Capitals' Nicklas Backstrom, centre, is congratulated by teammates after his goal against the Flyers.

Alex Ovechkin rallied the Washington Capitals to a 4-2 victory over their Eastern Conference rival the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday. The winger scored twice as the Caps came from 2-0 down to record their fifth win in a row and extend their lead in the Southeast Division to seven points. "It was a great game, especially coming back from [0-2] deficit," said Ovechkin.

The Capitals' goaltender, Jose Theodore, allowed two early goals from Scott Hartnell and Braydon Coburn in the first period. Ovechkin's snap shot at 16:08 in the second halved the deficit before Nicklas Backstrom tied the game two minutes later. Alexander Semin scored the go-ahead goal at 5:24 in the third before Ovechkin capped the scoring with an empty-netter. That strike gave him an NHL-leading 11 goals, while Theodore made a season-high 41 saves.

Elsewhere in the NHL, Jason Williams scored a power play goal with just over five minutes left to lead the Detroit Red Wings to a 5-4 win over the Vancouver Canucks. "If you're not shooting the puck, good things are not going to happen," Williams said. "That was our focus the last few games: just get pucks to the net and shoot as much as possible. It showed again, we got a lot of pucks on net and we were rewarded with goals."

Craig Anderson stopped 25 shots for his second shutout of the season as Colorado beat Edmonton 3-0. Wojtek Wolski had two goals and Milan Hejduk also scored as the Avalanche won their third game in a row. The Oilers have lost three consecutive games and have not scored in seven periods. "Overall it was a great team effort," Anderson said. "We didn't give them all that much and whatever we did, I was able to see and make the save."

* Reuters