Mats Zuccarello scored twice in the second period and the New York Rangers beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-1, in Game 6 on Saturday night to advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals.

Derek Stepan also scored and Henrik Lundqvist stopped 27 shots to help New York get past the first round for the fifth time in six years. The Rangers won three straight after falling behind, 2-1, to beat Montreal for the ninth time in 16 postseason series.

The Rangers will face the winner of the Ottawa-Boston series, which the Senators lead, 3-2.

Alexei Emelin scored for Montreal and Carey Price finished with 20 saves.

The Canadiens, winners of the Atlantic Division after missing the playoffs last year, were bounced from the postseason by the Rangers for the second time in four years. In 2014, it was in the conference finals.

After being outplayed for most of the first period, the Rangers came out more aggressive in the second and outshot the Canadiens, 12-8.

Montreal’s Jordie Benn was sent off for holding 1:30 into the second and the Rangers took advantage with their first power-play goal in the series. Zuccarello got a pass from Mika Zibanejad, who had the overtime winner in Game 5 on Thursday night, and sent it past Price from the right circle at 2:26. That fired up the Madison Square Garden crowd that was raucous during the national anthems but had been silenced by the Rangers’ lackluster play in the first period.

Zuccarello put the Rangers ahead with his second of the game and third of the postseason with 6:29 left in the middle period. He got a pass from Kevin Hayes in front and, with Benn standing in front of him, beat Price from the right side to send the home crowd into a frenzy.

The Canadiens pressed for the tying goal in the third, pulling Price for an extra skater with about 1½ minutes to go, but Lundqvist stopped all of their eight shots in the period.

Stepan added an empty-netter with 17.8 seconds remaining.

Montreal finished 0 for 3 on the power play, while New York converted its lone chance.

Looking to avoid elimination, the Canadiens came out aggressive in the first period. Montreal outshot New York, 11-6, though half of the Rangers’ shots came in the last 1:15 of the period.

Alexander Radulov tussled with Rangers captain Ryan McDonagh in front of the Canadiens goal about five minutes in. As that cleared up, Canadiens captain Max Pacioretty and New York rookie Jimmy Vesey dropped gloves and exchanged punches. The latter duo each received seven minutes of penalties.

Emelin, who returned to the lineup in Game 5 after missing the first four games, got the Canadiens on the scoreboard at 6:19 with his first career postseason goal. He beat Lundqvist with a wrist shot from the top of the right circle. Radulov got an assist on the play for his seventh point of the series.

Price denied a tip attempt by J.T. Miller at 7:38 on the Rangers’ first shot on goal of the game. About a minute later, Nick Holden’s shot went off Price’s shoulder.

Blues 4, Wild 3 — Magnus Paajarvi scored at the 9:42 mark in overtime, giving St. Louis a victory over host Minnesota in Game 5 of their playoff series, eliminating the Wild in the first round following the best season in franchise history.

The Blues advanced to play Nashville in the second round, with Game 1 against the Predators at home in St. Louis.

Jake Allen made 34 saves for the Blues, who led, 2-0 and 3-1, before a furious rally by the Wild to try to keep their season alive forced the extra frame.

Paajarvi’s first career playoff goal gave Blues coach Mike Yeo the satisfaction of beating the team that fired him a little over a year ago. Wild goalie Devan Dubnyk, who stopped 23 shots, turned the puck over to Vladimir Sobotka, who set up Paajarvi.

Mikko Koivu and Jason Zucker scored to bring the Wild back from their second two-goal hole, a deficit that held past the midpoint of the third period.

Ryan Suter scored the first of two power play goals by the Wild, who weathered an early barrage by the Blues and had a 26-12 advantage in shots on goal over the second and third periods and kept Allen busy enough to get a few pucks by him for once.

Vladimir Tarasenko scored for the first time in the series, Alexander Steen followed him 3:15 later for a 2-0 lead midway through the first period and Paul Stastny got a goal in his first appearance of the playoffs, but the Blues were still fortunate to make it to overtime with all the difficult saves Allen had to make and the way the Wild were buzzing around the ice at the end of regulation.

Allen stopped 174 of the 182 shots he faced in the series.

The Blues didn’t play a disciplined game, giving the Wild six power plays. Scottie Upshall was penalized for crosschecking late in the first period, before Suter’s slap shot put the Wild on the board for their first 5-on-4 goal of the series. They were 1 for 12 on the power play entering the afternoon, with the only score on a 5 on 3.

The Wild twice took penalties just 13 seconds after their own power play began, letting the Blues off the hook, but a holding call on Jay Boumeester midway through the third period foreshadowed the rebound try by Koivu that tied the game and sent the crowd into a frenzy. That was Koivu’s first goal in 22 games since March 7, which also came against the Blues.

The Wild had a goal waved off earlier in the third period for goaltender interference on Nino Niederreiter. Coach Bruce Boudreau challenged, arguing that Jori Lehtera pushed Niederreiter into Allen, but the video review upheld the call to trigger an angry, dismissive wave of the left hand by Boudreau.

With only two assists in the series entering the afternoon, Tarasenko was bound to break out. The Wild knew it, too, which is why they hesitated to congratulate themselves for applying such stifling defense on the 25-year-old Russian and the rest of the top Blues attackers with only four goals from the forwards over four games including one empty-netter.

Tarasenko, who had six goals in six games against the Wild in the playoffs in 2015 and scored nine times in 20 games during the run to the Western Conference finals last spring, used some fancy footwork to give the Blues the early lead. He charged in from the corner and, after a collision of sticks with Wild defenseman Jonas Brodin, kept the puck alive by pin-balling it off the inside of both skates before going to the opposite side to beat Dubnyk.