The three-game sweep of the NHL starts in Raleigh where Andrew Hammond made 35 saves to help the Ottawa Senators to a 2-1 win in extra time.
Hammond is now 11-0-1 and has allowed fewer than three goals in each of those games. That record start to his career ties him with Frank Brimsek.
“That was as good an effort as he’s had for us,” Ottawa coach Dave Cameron said. 
“He’s just been awesome. His play speaks for itself.”
The game was won in overtime on a goal from Mark Stone but the play will be remember for the moves by Kyle Turris in getting the puck deep to the right side of the Carolina Hurricanes net.
“I’ve done that move before and had some success in the past,” Turris said. “It was a nice play by [defenseman Erik Karlsson] to spring Stone and I to give us a 2-on-2 in the neutral zone. I knew there wasn’t much time left, so I figure I’d try to do something like that. [Hurricanes goalie Anton] Khudobin was good all night, so you had to get him going side to side.”
For Hammond it was apparently just another day at the office who now has a goals-against average of 1.35 and save percentage of .956.
“I’m playing a little bit deeper on those plays, where it’s scrambly,” Hammond said. “I’m just letting the play come back to me. That’s something that in the past has been a bit of an issue; I’d find myself chasing the puck a little bit. Now I know the puck has to get past me to get in the net, so I can play a little deeper and it’s eventually going to have to come to you still. It buys you just a little more time to react.”
In Nashville, the Minnesota scored just 22 seconds into extra time on a goal from Matt Dumba to take a 3-2 win over the Predators.
Ryan Suter and Zach Parise set up the goal with great efforts and passing.
“Great individual effort,” Wild coach Mike Yeo said. “I thought [Suter’s] third period was outstanding. I thought that he was good all game. I thought that our leaders really stepped up in the third period. That was a great effort.”
It was Dumba’s seventh goal of the season.
“The whole game was so much fun to play in,” Dumba said. “We stayed resilient like we have been, just working. It’s fun in these games, man. When we’re all working towards a common goal and we get rewarded for that by just sticking to it.”
Roman Josi scored twice for the Predators who have not been able to break out of the funk they find themselves over the last few weeks.
Devan Dubnyk made 25 saves for the win in his 28th straight start in the Wild net.
“I thought we had some good pressure in the second period and they didn’t have much, maybe three shots, so we tried to get a lot of shots through,” Josi said. “Filip made a great play on the first [goal], and Stalberg on the second. We got those two and we played well. We still have to be better in the third.”
Charlie Coyle scored both regulation goals for the Wild.
“It’s huge, especially against a team like this that’s ahead of us in the standings,” Coyle said. “It definitely helps us confidence-wise, especially on the road too. It gives us so much confidence going forward. We can still learn from these games which is huge, and we get two points too.”
In Newark, the Pittsburgh Penguins lost their third straight game, 2-0 to the host Devils.
Cory Schneider made 35 saves for the shutout, his fifth of the season.
“I’ve said from beginning that despite our record and how we’ve done, I don’t think we’ve ever given up,” Schneider said. “This is not where we want to be by any means [in the standings], but as a group we put the effort in most nights. [Pittsburgh] is a rival team and we don’t like them and they don’t like us. It’s nice to beat [them] at home.”
Jacob Josefson put the Devils up 1-0 in the second period and Adam Henrique sealed the win with an empty-netter in the third.
Things are getting tight for the Pens who trail the New York Islanders in the divisional race and are just ahead of the Washington Capitals who have regained their stride of late.
“The frustrating part is that we still are creating offense and getting a lot of pucks to the net but we haven’t been able to finish,” Penguins defenseman Paul Martin said. “That’s the toughest part. When you’re missing some key guys, that’s when you still need to make plays and get to the net and execute.”
In the three straight losses, the Pens have been blanked twice and outscored 9-1.
“I thought we did a pretty good job all game, but we still left a lot of chances out there,” the Penguins; Sidney Crosby said. “This is not a streak you want to run into at this time of year. The games are tight. We have to find a way. We had 35 shots. You think one might get through, but that wasn’t the case tonight. [Schneider] did make good saves when he had to, but we could have given him more. We don’t want to settle for games like this. We’re guilty of getting sucked into playing their game and that’s not our style.”
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