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Wednesday, Jan. 19 7:30pm ET
Elias ties franchise points streak mark | |||||
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EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) -- After spending the first couple of months of the season hitting everything but the net, New Jersey Devils left wing Patrik Elias seemingly can't miss. Elias scored twice in a three-goal third period and tied a franchise record with points in 12 straight games in leading the New Jersey Devils to a 4-1 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks on Wednesday night. "I tried not to think about the streak before the game but you guys let me know so many times so I had to," said Elias, who has 12 goals and seven assists in the streak. "It's really nice to get it because there are so many big names who made it." Defenseman Scott Stevens, Pat Verbeek and Aaron Broten are the other Devils who scored points in 12 straight, with Stevens doing it last in 1994. Jason Arnott and Jay Pandolfo also scored and Martin Brodeur, who shut out Chicago earlier this season, made 27 saves as surging New Jersey (10-1-2) opened a nine-point lead over second-place Philadelphia in the Atlantic Division. The Devils also have a five-point lead over Toronto for the best record in the Eastern Conference. Josef Marha scored for Chicago, and twice came within inches of giving the Blackhawks the lead in the third period. His first shot on a scramble in close rolled along the goal line. A steal by Eric Daze gave Marha another chance with 13:34 to go, but Brodeur stuck his leg and glove straight up to stop his backhander in close. "I tried to stay with him as much as possible," Brodeur said. "He took a step and went to his backhand and I just stuck the pad (up) and the puck stayed with me. I couldn't get rid of it. The puck stayed on top of my pad the longest time." Elias, who has 18 goals, broke the tie at 9:31, taking a nice cross-ice pass by Arnott and beating Jocelyn Thibault, who was outstanding in stopping 39 shots. Chicago defenseman Boris Mironov lost his stick on the play and his protests to referee Kevin Maguire earned him a 10-minute misconduct. "The game winner was a great goal," Thibault said. "You have to give them credit. Both teams deserved to win tonight." Elias, who had a 12-game goal drought in November and December, said he was thinking about winning, and not the streak, with the score tied in the third period. "We were trying to push ourselves to turn the game around and it worked out well for us," Elias said. Arnott stretched the lead to 3-1 with 5:24 to go, redirecting a pass by Petr Sykora past Thibault. Elias scored into an empty net with 14.2 seconds to play. After giving up an early goal, Thibault kept the Blackhawks in the game until a Devils' error on the power play allowed Daze to set up Marha for the game-tying goal. Chicago's Steve Sullivan cleared the puck behind the Devils net and Daze seemed to catch New Jersey defenseman Scott Niedermayer by surprise, riding him off the puck and then finding Marha alone in front for his first goal in 29 games. Pandolfo ended a 16-game goal-scoring drought in giving the Devils a 1-0 lead at 3:07 of the first. He took a pass from Sergei Brylin and lifted the puck over Thibault while being pulled down. | ALSO SEE NHL Scoreboard Chicago Clubhouse New Jersey Clubhouse  Morganti: Devils overcome obstacles
RECAPS Boston 4 Atlanta 3
New Jersey 4 AUDIO/VIDEO   Jason Arnott gives the smooth assist to Patrik Elias.avi: 699 k RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1   | |||||