PHILADELPHIA – Alex Tuch had a shorthanded goal late in the third period on Saturday to complete a hat trick and help send the Buffalo Sabres y s 6-3 win over the Flyers.
Buffalo is four points back of the Florida Panthers for the second wild card in the Eastern Conference.
“The objective is to get a playoff spot and we’ve dealt with the pressure of that, we’ve dealt with the pressure of that through injuries,” Buffalo coach Don Granato said. “We had a tough time compensating for it. Now we’ve hit a groove and a rhythm and it’s been great.”
Morgan Frost scored the first of a pair of goals for the Flyers in the first period to give them a 1-0 lead.
“Too many critical errors I think, especially with that stretch in the second period,” Frost said. “Just mental mistakes and giving up odd-man rushes. I feel like for the most part of the year that’s been relatively uncharacteristic for us. Can’t have that.”
Kyle Okposo hit for a goal with 10 seconds left in the stanza to send it to the middle frame tied, 1-1.
“It’s always nice to score last minute,” Okposo said. “We didn’t have the best period, a little sleepy in our details. To go into the locker room tied 1-1, it was really big for us. Came out in the second [period] and obviously scored a few quick ones.”
Buffalo moved to 37-31-7.
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen made 39 saves in the Sabres win.
In the middle frame, the Sabres took over the game with a goal from Tuch for a 2-1 lead, and then from Jordan Greenway and Jeff Skinner for a 4-1 advantage.
“We started going a little bit and started connecting and obviously when you put a couple in, you get a little bit more momentum, a little bit of energy and just feed off of that,” Tuch said. “We were able to capitalize on our opportunities and it went a long way.”
Tuch scored at 16:02 for a 5-1 lead to the Sabres before the Flyers replied with Frost’s second for a 5-2 score.
Travis Konecny scored at 5:11 of the third to trim the deficit to 5-3.
Tuch then finished his hat trick for the 6-3 final.
“I probably should have buried one earlier than that,” Tuch said. “That felt really good. A great play by [Jack Quinn there to set me up, great job on the PK forcing, made a really good pass. Frustrated myself that I didn’t bury the last breakaway I had so I thought I want to maybe deke on that one instead.”
Felix Sandstrom made 23 saves in the loss.
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