Crosby’s highlight-reel goal, milestone assist lift Penguins

Pittsburgh • Sidney Crosby ignited a rally with a highlight-reel goal and became the third active player with 700 assists in the Pittsburgh Penguins’ 5-3 victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Wednesday night.

Crosby scored his 24th goal when he knocked a pass from Jake Guentzel out of the air, deflected it toward the front of his stick and smacked it by Carey Price to tie it at 3 late in the second period.

Derick Brassard put the Penguins in front to stay, beating Price early in the third.

Guentzel had a goal and two assists. His 21st goal of the season came off an assist from Crosby, the 700th of Crosby’s career. Evgeni Malkin and Patric Hornqvist also scored, and Casey DeSmith made 27 saves.

Jonathan Drouin, Nikita Scherbak and Jacob de la Rose scored for the Canadiens. They have lost nine of their last 10 games. Price made 34 stops in his first start in a month due to a concussion.

Blues 2, Bruins 1, OT • In St. Louis, Jaden Schwartz scored his second goal of the game 30 seconds into overtime to lift St. Louis past Boston.

Schwartz skated up the middle and fired a shot past Anton Khudobin. The Blues won for the fifth time in six games to move within a point of the final Western Conference wild-card spot.

Jake Allen made 21 saves to improve to 24-21-2.

Ryan Donato scored for Boston. The Bruins clinched a playoff spot and moved within four points of Tampa Bay for the Eastern lead.

Coyotes 4, Sabres 1 • In Buffalo, N.Y., layton Keller had two assists to break the Arizona record for points by a rookie in the Coyotes’ victory over Buffalo in a matchup of the NHL’s two worst teams.

Rookie Dylan Strome scored in his first game after being called up from the minors. Derek Stepan had a goal and assist, and Richard Panik and Max Domi, with an empty-netter, also scored. Antti Raanta stopped 29 shots to improve to 12-4-4 in his past 20 starts.

Keller, Arizona’s 2016 first-round draft pick, extended his points streak to six games, in which he has two goals and five assists. He has 55 points, one more than Peter Mueller had in setting the rookie team record in 2007-08. And Keller has 35 assists, one more than teammate Max Domi had in his rookie season two years ago. Arizona improved to 13-5-2 in its past 20, and earned its 61st point in leaving Vancouver alone at the bottom of the Western Conference standings.

Jordan Nolan scored for Buffalo.

Ducks 4, Flames 0 • In Calgray, Alberta, John Gibson stopped 29 shots to lead Anaheim over Calgary.

Gibson earned his fourth shutout of the season and 16th of his career. He is 12-3-1 in his last 16 starts.

Francois Beauchemin had a goal and an assist for Anaheim, and Andrew Cogliano, Ondrej Kase, Hamphus Lindholm also scored for the Ducks, who’ve won four straight and are tied with Colorado for sixth in the Western Conference, one point ahead of the Los Angeles Kings.

Mike Smith started in goal for Calgary but was replaced after allowing three goals on 11 shots. Rookie David Rittich stopped four of the five shots he faced.