clarinews@clarinet.com (01/14/90)
VANCOUVER, British Columbia (UPI) -- Ray Sheppard scored his first goal of the season to help the Buffalo Sabres end a six-game losing streak with a 5-3 triumph over the Vancouver Canucks. The Canucks have lost four in a row. Sheppard scored at 4:21 of the second period to put the Sabres up 3-1. He deflected a pass from Pierre Turgeon over goaltender Steve Weeks, who replaced Kirk McLean at the start of the second period. Vancouver closed within 3-2 when Andrew McBain fed Vladimir Krutov with a pass, sending him on a breakaway. Krutov slipped the puck between Daren Puppa's legs to collect his second goal of the game and eighth of the season at 14:12. While Puppa was steady between the pipes for the Sabres, Weeks was near brilliant, stopping Benoit Hogue on a breakaway late in the second, and Pierre Turgeon and Dave Snuggerud in the third. But Buffalo began to put the game out of reach when Mike Ramsey clicked with a power-play goal at 16:35 of the second period to record his third this year. Andrew McBain drew the Canucks within 4-3 at 7:39 of the third when he skated around Phil Housley and snapped his seventh goal past Puppa. Vancouver put plenty of pressure on Buffalo in the period and Trevor Linden almost scored on an empty net, but Mike Ramsey dove in front of the shot to save a goal. Snuggerud added an empty net goal at 19:18 of the final frame to clinch the win. Buffalo opened scoring at 2:05 of the first period on the power-play when Dave Andreychuk fed the puck to Turgeon, who snapped his 20th goal of the season past McLean. Krutov tied the score 1-1 at 11:09 of the first when he used teammate Igor Larionov as a decoy on a two-on-one to beat Puppa on the stick side. For Krutov, it was his seventh goal. Vancouver appeared to take the lead a couple minutes later when Brian Bradley picked up the puck in front of the net and fired a shot at the Sabre goal. The puck seemed to dribble about 10 inches past the goal line, but referee Lance Roberts disallowed the goal. Buffalo took a 2-1 lead early in the second period when Scott Arniel brought the puck into the Canucks' zone and slid it over to a wide open Snuggerud, who one-timed it past Weeks to collect his fifth goal of the year.