PITTSBURGH -- Pittsburgh's Kris Letang scored the only goal of the shootout with a pretty backhand past New York Islanders rookie goalie Jean-Francois Berube to lift the Penguins to a 2-1 victory on Tuesday night.
Marc-Andre Fleury stopped Frans Nielsen, Kyle Okposo and John Tavares in the shootout as Pittsburgh strengthened its hold on the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference.
Fleury finished with 25 saves for the Penguins. Chris Kunitz scored his 14th goal of the season in the 800th game of his career. Sidney Crosby picked up the secondary assist to extend his points streak to nine games.
Berube made 33 stops in his third NHL start, including several in the extra period. Okposo's score at 14:35 of the third sent the game to overtime, but the Islanders couldn't pick up the additional point when they failed to solve Fleury in the shootout (see full recap).
Capitals beat 'Canes, clinch playoff berth
WASHINGTON -- Alex Ovechkin scored in overtime and the Washington Capitals picked up their 50th win of the season and became the first NHL team to clinch a playoff spot as they beat the Carolina Hurricanes 2-1 Tuesday night.
Ovechkin scored his seventh game-winner of the season 2:38 into overtime after the Capitals clinched a playoff spot by picking up a point.
It's their eighth playoff appearance in nine seasons and one that has been inevitable for a long time as they've skated away from the rest of the field.
NHL
Justin Williams also scored for Washington, which got 25 saves from Braden Holtby.
Hurricanes goaltender Eddie Lack stopped 29 of the 31 shots he faced. Jordan Staal scored for Carolina, which had its dim playoff hopes take another hit (see full recap).
Lowly Leafs take down Lightning
TORONTO -- Ben Smith and Connor Carrick scored their first goals of the season and the Toronto Maple Leafs defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-1 Tuesday night.
With the win, the Leafs have won back-to-back games and picked up points in four of their past five.
Zach Hyman and P.A. Parenteau added empty-net goals while Jonathan Bernier made 26 saves for his ninth win of the season.
Brian Boyle scored for Tampa Bay. Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 20 shots in the loss (see full recap).