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Wellwood, Ponikarovsky help Maple Leafs roll over Rangers

Dec 17, 2006 - 4:43 AM TORONTO (Ticker) -- Kyle Wellwood led the early onslaught that resulted in a rough night for New York Rangers goaltender Henrik Lundqvist.

Wellwood recorded his first career hat trick and added two assists and Alexei Ponikarovsky netted two goals and set up three others for the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 9-2 rout of the Rangers.

Toronto set a season high in goals in winning its third straight contest after dropping the previous seven. Five tallies came in the first period, helping the Maple Leafs end the Rangers' five-game winning streak.

"There's not much coaching that goes into a 9-2 game," Toronto coach Paul Maurice said. "You just grind your teeth and hope nobody gets hurt."

Defenseman Carlo Colaiacovo opened the scoring with his first goal of the season at 5:33 of the first period before Ponikarovsky netted his 10th just 27 seconds later on a shot that deflected off blue-liner Marek Malik's skate.

"What do you say about Carlo?" Toronto captain Mats Sundin said. "He's been good luck for us. He scored a great goal to start us off, and I think him and Pavel Kubina looked good tonight."

After defenseman Darius Kasparaitis scored his first goal since December 20, 2003, to halve the deficit for New York, Wellwood netted tallies 2:18 apart, including one during a 5-on-3 advantage.

"These games happen," Rangers left wing Brendan Shanahan said. "Their first few goals were strange bounces, and it gave them lot of life and put us behind the eight-ball. There's not that much to dissect. We got clobbered."

Wellwood completed the hat trick with his ninth tally of the season at 5:18 of the second session before setting up Ponikarovsky for his 11th later in the period on a shot that got by Lundqvist's right pad.

"Usually, you don't get to play after four points in junior (hockey), but I had a hat trick and a five-point night in junior," Wellwood said. "We had some bounces go in and we were very lucky to play them when they weren't as good (as they normally are)."

Darcy Tucker scored his team-leading 19th goal in the second session and Sundin collected three assists for the second time this season as the Maple Leafs defeated the Rangers for the first time in five tries.

"We played a good hockey game tonight," Tucker said. "You have to give everybody a lot of credit to how we played. ... We got a lot of good bounces. ... Some nights, the puck goes in, and tonight was one of them."

Netminder Andrew Raycroft needed to make just 11 saves to raise his record to 14-10-3 for Toronto.

Martin Straka scored his 17th goal early in the third period and Jaromir Jagr recorded two assists to top the club with 32 for the Rangers, who slipped to 11-6-1 on the road.

"It was one of those nights when every possible bad bounce you can get, we got," New York center Matt Cullen said. "It was one of those kind of games and it sort of snowballed. Certainly, we didn't play our best."

Lundqvist allowed a career-high eight goals on 24 shots before being replaced by Kevin Weekes after two periods.

"I'm not surprised by this, but I'm certainly disappointed," Rangers coach Tom Renney said. "We were completely inept in front of (Lundquist)."