DARLINGTON, S.C. — Justin Allgaier used a dominating performance Saturday to win his first Xfinity race of the season and the third of his career at Darlington Raceway.

Allgaier led 119 of 147 laps, sweeping both stages as he finished ahead of Austin Hill and defending series champion Cole Custer.

Allgaier moved past Hill early in the second stage and never gave up the lead, staying in front for the final 95 laps.

“I think having a little gray hair today really helped me out, though, with those long green-flag runs,” said Allgaier, 37. “Being able to know what’s worked in the past here.”

Only two of the five cautions in the race were for accidents — and they proved to be Allgaier’s trickiest moments of the race.

The first came with 39 laps to go after Hailie Deegan wrecked, and the other came with 16 laps left when Kyle Sieg spun out. Allgaier sped off from the field both times and cruised to his 24th career Xfinity victory to equal the total of JR Motorsports owner Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Allgaier also moved up in Darlington history, his three wins here tying for fifth with the late Dale Earnhardt, Matt Kenseth and Geoff Bodine.

Sam Mayer, Allgaier’s JR Motorsports teammate, finished fourth and AJ Allmendinger fifth.

Hill, who was runner-up to Denny Hamlin in last September’s Xfinity race at Darlington, blamed himself for another second-place showing.

“I just couldn’t get into Turn 1 on restarts like I really needed to all day and I think a lot of it’s just me,” Hill said. “I’ve just got to figure out what to do differently.”

Three-time Cup Series winner William Byron was the biggest name in the field and figured to contend at a track where several from the sports’ top series have won before. But Byron’s chance ended when he hit the wall early in the race.

A bad pit stop left him three laps down less than 15 laps in, and he ended up finishing 11th.

The series takes next week off before resuming at Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 26.

PRAGUE — Connor Bedard scored twice as Canada opened its title defense at the ice hockey world championship with a 4-2 win over newcomer Britain on Saturday.

Bedard, coming off a great rookie season with the Chicago Blackhawks, scored twice in a four-minute span of the second period to put the Group A game in Prague out of reach.

Canada had to rally from a goal down despite outshooting Britain 12-3 in the opening period and 34-15 overall.

Liam Kirk put Britain 1-0 ahead on a power play eight minutes into the game, but the lead lasted just 30 seconds as Michael Bunting scored from the point to tie it at 1.

Brandon Hagel put the defending champions ahead 5:45 into the second period with a shot into the roof of the net.

Then it was Bedard’s turn.

Bedard, 18, beat goaltender Jackson Whistle (30 saves) midway through the frame for his first goal at the senior worlds. He made it 4-1 after Nick Paul fed him with a perfect pass.

Ben O’Connor scored in the third period for Britain.

In Group B in the city of Ostrava, Kazakhstan defeated France 3-1 in their opening game.

The United States hopes to recover from an opening 5-2 loss to Sweden in a Group B game against Germany later Saturday.

Poland, another newcomer in the top division, faces last year’s bronze medalist Latvia in the same group, while Austria plays Denmark and the Czech Republic meets Norway in Group A.

Mystik Dan, the horse who won the Kentucky Derby by a nose in the race’s closest finish in more than a half-century, is heading to the Preakness next weekend after all, keeping alive the chance of another Triple Crown winner.

Trainer Kenny McPeek announced the decision Saturday after speaking with owners and weighing the pros and cons of racing his horse again on a short, two-week turnaround. He initially expressed concern about that timeframe after Mystik Dan ran poorly under the same circumstances in November.

But he liked enough of what he saw in training to take a chance.

“All systems go,” McPeek said Saturday. “The horse is doing fantastic.”

The possibility of Mystik Dan, who finished just ahead of Sierra Leone and Forever Young in the 1 1/4-mile race at Churchill Downs last weekend thanks to a perfect, rail-skimming ride by jockey Brian Hernandez Jr., not going to the Preakness next Saturday raised questions about the status of the prestigious race. Twice in the previous four years, the Derby winner did not run — a product of various circumstances.

But the lure of going to Baltimore was too much to pass up for McPeek, who won the pandemic-delayed 2020 Preakness with filly Swiss Skydiver, who beat Derby champion Authentic.

No one has won both the Derby and Preakness since the last Triple Crown champion, Justify in 2018 for Hall of Famer Bob Baffert. Mystik Dan doing so would set up a first: a Triple Crown on the line at Saratoga Race Course, where the Belmont is being held for the next two years while the race’s longtime home on Long Island is being torn down and rebuilt as part of a massive, $455 million reconstruction project.

But Mystik Dan may not be the Preakness favorite. That distinction likely belongs to Muth, one of two horses being brought by Baffert, who was again not allowed to enter horses in the Derby because of a ban on him by Churchill Downs caused by Medina Spirit failing a drug test after finishing first in the race in 2021.

The only other horse from the Derby expected to run in the Preakness is 17th-place finisher Just Steel, trained by 88-year-old Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas.