In the three-game sweep of the NHL from Friday, the Carolina Hurricanes start off the sweep with a 4-1 win over the Columbus Blue Jackets in Raleigh.
Canes coach Bill Peters was pleased with his team’s goal production off deflections in front of the net.
“I love the greasy ones, I love the deflections,” Peters. “They’re not getting blocked up top. We’ve got guys trying to get to the net with and without the puck, so that’s encouraging.”
Elias Lindholm scored two goals and Jordan Staal and Chris Terry scored for Carolina.
Cam Ward made 35 saves for the win.
“Our goalie made some big saves,” Kris Versteeg said. “Ward was a big reason we stayed in the game and had a chance to win.”
Brandon Dubinsky scored the only Jackets goal on the power play in the second period to even the game at one.
“Yeah, we score one,” Columbus coach John Tortorella said. “You get another 5-on-3, it may change the momentum of the game completely. We don’t. I don’t think we gave them a whole bunch, but they scored on their chances. We just didn’t develop enough to score goals on ours.”
Anton Forsberg took the loss in the Jackets net with 25 saves.
“There’s a lot of good things we’ve done,” said Staal, who had an assist on the empty-net goal and has four points in two games. “We’ve had some unfortunate losses, but we’ve played a lot of great games that we know we’re building on as a group. We’ve got a young, hard-working team. It’s fun to be part of as a player.”
In Denver, Ryan Johansen scored for his new team, the Nashville Predators but the Colorado Avalanche won the game, 5-3, on a strong effort from across the bench.
“It was another solid performance by our team tonight,” Avalanche coach Patrick Roy said. “We took the lead on the power play and I was very happy to see that we didn’t change our game, kept going at them. We were there to play solid hockey, smart hockey. Made good decisions, good management.”
Tyson Barrie scored the game-winner on the power play.
“I think one of their guys lost his stick, broke his stick or whatever,” Barrie said. “It was a good play by Holden. The puck went to him and their guy went back to the bench for a stick. I was screaming for it and he made a nice pass to me and I tried to get it on net.”
For Johansen, it was a relief to get on the board early with his new team.
“It is definitely nice to get something early like that,” said Johansen, who had two shots on goal and won 12 of 22 faceoffs in 17:46 of ice time. “Hopefully, I can use that as some confidence and move forward in shooting the puck. It’s too bad we couldn’t find a way to win this one. It would have been a lot cooler.
“I felt pretty comfortable. I made some mistakes on the power play systematically, but what matters is it’s a lot easier when you have guys like [James] Neal on the one side and Forsberg on the other. They made it a lot easier out there for me and I had fun even though we didn’t come out on top.”
The newly acquired Johansen impressed his new coach.
“He was really good,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “I thought he had a solid game, Neal was good, he was good. Filip was good when he went up on that line.”
Both clubs are tied with 45 points in the standings with the Preds holding a game in hand.
“To think a month ago we were nine points behind these guys says a lot about our club, what we’ve been able to do and how hard we’ve worked,” Barrie said. “It’s nice to see results. There’s a lot of season left, but I think we’re building towards something and we’re getting better every night.”
In Chicago, rookie center Phillip Danault scored the game-winner at 15:01 of the third period to help the Blackhawks to a 3-1 win over the Buffalo Sabres.
“I was anxious [to get the first goal], but all the guys were telling me, ‘Phil, keep going, you’re on the right path,’ and they were right,” Danault said. “The first goal is hard to get for some guys, [and] some guys not. For me, it was hard to get, but a big achievement.”
Corey Crawford made 28 saves to pick up the win, his fourth straight.
“We’re playing the way we’re supposed to play,” Crawford said. “We’re not taking risks around the ice. We’re not putting pucks in areas you’re not supposed to. [We’re] taking what we get and also moving our feet [and] playing as a team. We’re getting some key goals too throughout this stretch.”
Niklas Hjalmarsson and Jonathan Toews also scored for the Hawks.
Ryan O’Reilly scored for the Sabres and Chad Johnson had 42 saves in the loss.
“We battled back there, get a great play and a great goal to tie the game,” Buffalo coach Dan Bylsma said. “We have [7:23] minutes left to go in the game, feels like you give it right back with that goal [by Danault]. [It was] kind of a halfhearted change play. We get it out and we’re coming off the ice, and they go quick up. [It’s] just difficult to give it back to them like that.”
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