In Raleigh, the Hurricanes’ Sebastian Aho and Nino Niederreiter hit for doubles on Wednesday night in a 5-2 win over the Boston Bruins.
The win gives Carolina a 2-0 lead in their first round series.
Game 3 is in Boston on Friday night.
Backup goalie, Pyotr Kochetkov, made 30 saves in the Carolina win.
“We’ve got faith in the kid,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “We’ve seen him. It’s not like we’re just throwing him in. The guys responded in the way they played in front of him, but he responded in the way he played. There’s a lot of faith in that group with our goalie.”
Kochetkov was pressed into service when starter, Antti Raanta was injured in the first period, he made six saves.
Patrice Bergeron struck for a pair of goals for the Bruins.
Carolina was 2-for-9 on the power play.
“Their special teams were good tonight,” Boston coach Bruce Cassidy said. “I thought our power play was better, produced. And then it comes down to discipline. We were in the box a lot tonight, and you have to look at that and see what was warranted, what wasn’t, but that can’t continue either.”
Jesper Fast, opened the scoring to give Carolina a 1-0 lead in the first period.
Aho scored in the first period for a 2-0 lead, and hit for a power play goal in the middle frame for a 3-0 advantage to the Canes.
“It’s high-paced, very intense, physical,” Aho said. “A lot happened in that game. As a player, you love to play a game like that.”
Bergeron cut the lead to 3-1 before Niederreiter scored for a 4-1 bulge.
“One game at a time. That’s all we can focus on now, it’s game three,” Bergeron said. “It’s playoff hockey, you have some adversity. For us it’s early. So, you know, back to game three.”
Niederreiter’s second goal was an empty-net strike with less than a minute left on the game clock, and the 5-2 final.
Linus Ullmark made 29 saves. in the Bruins loss.
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