Blue Jackets rout Sabres, 9-4

In Buffalo, the Sabres found a new low on Tuesday night.

Rasmus Dahlin scored with 30 seconds gone in the game to give the Sabres a 1-0 lead.

That was the high point of the march as the visiting Columbus Blue Blue Jackets posted seven straight goals to brush aside Buffalo in a 9-4 win.

“It just has to be an everyday thing,” Buffalo’s Kyle Okposo said. “It’s not like you can flip a light switch and then, all of a sudden, we’re right back to where we were last year, or we are back to how we can play. We know we can play. We’ve had had games this year where we’ve outplayed some of the best teams in the League, but we’re not doing it on a consistent enough basis.

“That’s the NHL. It’s 82 games, it’s not 40, it’s not 35, it’s 82. It’s going to punish you if you are off and that’s what’s happening to us too many nights. It’s going to be on all of us to find solutions and we’re not going to stop trying to find those. We’re going to look at the tape, we’re going to speak. We have done a lot of talking and now it’s time to go out and play.”

Light switch or not, something has to be turned on, or off, in Buffalo.

Kirill Marchenko hit for a natural hat trick for the Blue Jackets

Daniil Tarasov made 25 saves in the win.

“It’s an exciting win for us,” Columbus’ Johnny Gaudreau (one goal) said. “Come out hard in the first, take the lead, play well in the second, and then obviously they got a little momentum off the power play, but we fought back and found a way to score a couple more in the third. Everyone contributed offensively, ‘Tarry’ played great.”

The Blue Jackets moved to 11-17-5.

Gaudreau’s goal tied the game, 1-1, midway through the first period.

Columbus’ Adam Fantilli gave them a 2-1 at 14:40of the first.

Marchenko scored his first with 12 seconds left in the first, and a 3-1 lead headed to the middle frame.

Marchenko then picked up his hat trick with two goals in 18 seconds.

His first came at 7:37 of the middle frame for a 4-1 lead, and his third of the outburst was at 7:55 for a 5-1 advantage.

“When we play all together, it’s easy,” Marchenko said of his Russian linemates, Yegor Chinakhov and Dmitri Voronkov. “I know if I make a mistake ‘Vorny’ can help, ‘Chinny’ helped me. … We have more confidence, we want to score more goals and just do next step, think about next step.”

Columbus was not done in the second period.

Erik Gudbranson scored at 8:52 for a 6-1 lead, and Sean Kuraly potted a marker at 12:27 for a 7-1 gap in the score.

“I think there are times where we play as a young group and it’s not always easy,” Okposo said. “This is not an easy league. It’s an [unforgiving] league. If you are off at all, it is gonna get shoved down your throat really hard and that’s exactly what happened tonight. And when you don’t have a game that you feel 100 percent comfortable that you can fall back on and play to an identity, that’s what happens.

“That’s what happened to us and that’s on us. That’s on everybody in this room. Everybody. Probably myself more and I’ll take the blame for not having the group ready. Put it all on me. That’s fine. I’ll take that.”

Okposo stopped the Blue Jackets’ run when he scored with 66 seconds left in the frame for a 7-2 count headed to the third.

The Sabres dropped to 13-17-3.

Buffalo scored twice in the third scored twice in the third to close the chasm to 7-4, on goals from Tage Thompson, off the power play, at 2:57, and Dylan Cozens at 7:51.

“It’s actions,” Thompson said. “We can say all the things we want to say in the locker room, we’ve got to go out and do it. It’s as simple as that.”

Columbus replied with strikes from Cole Sillinger at 8:30 for a 8-4 lead, and Kent Johnson midway through the period for the 9-4 final count.