The Vancouver Canucks hired Jim Benning as general manager Wednesday. Benning is the first significant hire made by Trevor Linden, the former Canucks star who took over as president of hockey operations after the team missed the playoffs for the first time in six years. The 51-year-old Benning spent the last eight seasons with the Boston Bruins, including seven as assistant general manager. The former Canucks defenseman replaces Mike Gillis, fired as president and general manager a day after the club was eliminated from playoff contention.

Jeff Carter and the Los Angeles Kings know how to come back in the playoffs. Carter scored three of Los Angeles' six straight goals, and the Kings beat the Chicago Blackhawks 6-2 on Wednesday night to even the Western Conference final at a game apiece. Tyler Toffoli and Jake Muzzin also scored in Los Angeles' five-goal third period to help the Kings become the first visiting team to win in Chicago this postseason. The Blackhawks won their first seven home playoff games this year, but the Kings skated right by Chicago after the defending Stanley Cup champion Blackhawks took a 2-0 lead in the second period.

San Francisco 49ers linebacker Aldon Smith pleaded no contest Wednesday to three felony weapons charges and two misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence. The 24-year-old Smith entered his pleas in a Santa Clara County Superior Courtroom in San Jose. ''Mr. Smith has now accepted responsibility and has pleaded to all of the charges,'' Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen said.

Madison Square Garden underwent a recent $1 billion transformation, and yet it will have another completely different feeling once the New York Rangers hit the ice in the Eastern Conference finals. Gone will be the fear of impending doom that enveloped the club during its second-round comeback against Pittsburgh. Suddenly, the Rangers are the front-runners against the Montreal Canadiens, and their fans now have the chance to celebrate the ride with them. ''Having fan support is obviously huge,'' Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said.

Former NFL lineman Jeremy Newberry often hobbled into the 49ers locker room on game days using a walking boot and crutches, then lined up behind as many as two dozen teammates, in his case to get a shot of the painkiller Toradol in the butt. The toughness of pro football players may be legendary, but a lawsuit filed Tuesday on behalf of more than 600 former players contends it was abetted by team physicians and trainers across the NFL who routinely - and often illegally - dispensed powerful narcotics and other controlled substances on game days to mask the pain. Sometimes, the lawsuit also charges, the drugs were given in combinations as ''cocktails.'' ''The stuff works,'' Newberry, who played seven of his nine seasons in San Francisco before retiring in 2009, told The Associated Press in an interview. Newberry, now 38 and one of the eight plaintiffs so far named in the lawsuit, says that because of the drugs he took while playing, he suffers from kidney failure, high blood pressure and violent headaches.