Hurricanes ride offensive outburst into showdown with Sabres
The Buffalo Sabres and Carolina Hurricanes have been a couple of point-hungry teams of late and will get a chance to feast on each other when they meet Monday afternoon in Raleigh, N.C.
The Hurricanes are the second team in the NHL to reach 30 wins, behind the Colorado Avalanche. The Sabres have points in 16 of their last 18 games.
The Hurricanes have won six of their last eight games and secured a point in one of those losses. They outscored the Florida Panthers and New Jersey Devils by a combined 13-2 on back-to-back nights, including a nine-goal effort against the Panthers on Friday.
"You're going to see some goofy scores," Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff said, referring to the rapid-fire nature of teams' schedules. "I think you see that around the league right now."
Nikolaj Ehlers and Andrei Svechnikov had hat tricks in consecutive games for the Hurricanes. Sebastian Aho's five points in those games all came on assists and boosted him to 50 points in 49 appearances.
Svechnikov and Aho have become a dynamic tandem at times, as shown by Svechnikov scoring twice in 57 seconds at New Jersey.
"All of a sudden, that's what they can do," Hurricanes coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "Within a minute, all of a sudden, you get a couple of opportunities, and Svechy buried them."
Svechnikov said he has the easy part when on the ice with Aho and Seth Jarvis.
"(Aho) just kind of created the space for me on all three goals," Svechnikov said. "I just kind of had to shoot the puck. Amazing plays from them."
The Hurricanes' nine goals against the Panthers came after they were shut out for the first time this season Tuesday at St. Louis.
Buffalo lost 5-4 at home loss to the Minnesota Wild on Saturday afternoon and head into another daytime affair Monday.
"There were a handful of times in a good area where we didn't deliver," Ruff said, lamenting the close defeat.
Buffalo has some moving parts with its lineup, but there are encouraging aspects to the situation.
Defenseman Michael Kesselring played for the first time since Dec. 31 after recovering from an ankle injury. He had a scoring chance and a fight in Saturday's opening period.
"He was trying to make his presence felt. I thought he did," Ruff said. "You could see early on he wanted to try to make a difference with the puck. He wanted to get involved offensively."
Now it's a matter of becoming comfortable as some pairings have shifted.
"I think they struggled just a little bit with the puck," Ruff said. "First game back sometimes can be understandable. Not a lot of practice time under pressure. But that will come for them."
Carolina beat the Sabres 6-3 at home on Nov. 8. Winning goalie Pyotr Kochetkov is out long term after undergoing ankle surgery, and Brandon Bussi (17-3-1) is likely to be in net Monday.
The Sabres, who begin a stretch of five straight road games Monday, had some notable offensive numbers over the weekend. Rasmus Dahlin notched his 305th assist, moving to eighth place on Buffalo's all-time list, and Jack Quinn has scored four goals in a five-game stretch.