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CALGARY, Alberta (AP) - Jarome Iginla and the Calgary Flames wasted little time reclaiming the Northwest Division lead from the Colorado Avalanche.
A day after Calgary dropped a point behind Colorado with a loss in Denver, Iginla scored his 29th and 30th goals of the season and Miikka Kiprusoff made 26 saves to help the Flames beat the Avalanche 4-3 on Monday night.
"We didn't like the way we woke up this morning and saw they had jumped ahead of us," Iginla said. "That's what makes these back-to-backs so much fun is if you lose, you get a chance to get right back at it."
Bryan Marchment and Chuck Kobasew also scored to help the Flames rebound from their 3-0 loss in Colorado on Sunday.
"Yesterday, we didn't show up, we didn't play the way we wanted to, so we re-focused and re-prepared for the game tonight," Kobasew said. "It's a playoff atmosphere when you get to play the same team the following day with it fresh in your mind what happened the previous day."
Joe Sakic, Milan Hejduk and Alex Tanguay had third-period goals for the Avalanche.
"We obviously needed those two points to send a message, not only to the Flames whom we might see in the postseason, but to the rest of the division and conference," Colorado forward Dan Hinote said. "We realize we're not where we want, which is that top spot, which we had yesterday. We've still got a lot of work to do."
Iginla and Marchment scored in the first period, and Iginla made 3-0 with a power-play goal at 2:52 of the second.
"Coming in here, we knew what kind of battle to expect and they brought it, but then we weren't ready," Hinote said.
Sacic made it 3-1 at 4:33 of the third, and Hejduk cut it to a goal with a power-play score at 8:02. Kobasew countered for the Flames with 3:54 left, and Tanguay completed the scoring with 1:25 remaining.
"Like I said last week when we had 20 games left, we need 20 big goals," Flames coach Darryl Sutter said. "It's not how many goals or any of that stuff, the stats and all that is for you guys, it's about scoring big goals and the biggest goal tonight was Chuck's."
Peter Budaj made 26 saves for Colorado.
Notes: Iginla reached the 30-goal mark for the fifth consecutive season. ... The Flames will open a seven-game trip Thursday night in Edmonton. ... The victory was the 400th of Flames coach Darryl Sutter's NHL career. ... Jamie Lundmark made his Flames debut. He was acquired from Phoenix on Thursday. ... Calgary is 10-0-0 when Iginla has a multiple point game.
Other games on March 13, 2006
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