Antti Raanta made 32 saves and the Carolina Hurricanes were propelled by two early goals in a 4-0 victory against the Ottawa Senators on Friday night at Raleigh, N.C.
Brent Burns, Seth Jarvis, Martin Necas and Brady Skjei scored as the Hurricanes won their fifth consecutive game and have victories in 12 of their last 13 games. Andrei Svechnikov and Sebastian Aho both had two assists.
The Senators have their first two-game skid since Jan. 20-21. This week's setbacks came against Boston and Carolina -- the teams with the top two point totals in the NHL.
Ottawa entered with the NHL's fourth-best power-play rate, but the Senators were frustrated by Carolina's penalty killing.
Goalie Cam Talbot was back after a nine-game injury absence and stopped 26 of 29 shots.
Burns scored 3:48 into the game on a shot that zinged past Talbot, who was trying to recover after Jarvis was pushed into him. Jarvis was in the goal when the puck arrived, and the Senators were perturbed that the goal was allowed.
Then less than three minutes later, Jarvis put on some moves in front of Talbot before delivering his 13th goal of the season.
Burns has at least one point in 12 of the last 13 games. Svechnikov has three multi-point outings in his last four games.
The Hurricanes held a 12-1 edge in shots through the first 10 minutes.
But Carolina was in a bind at times by committing four penalties in the game's first 29 minutes. The Senators didn't convert, even holding a 5-on-3 advantage for a brief stretch early in the second period.
Ottawa's Thomas Chabot and Alex DeBrincat had shots that nearly made it to the net. Both times the puck ended up hitting posts, though Raanta's glove save partially deflected DeBrincat's attempt.
In the third period after the Hurricanes killed a fifth power play of the game, Necas supplied his 23rd goal of the season. Skjei's empty-net goal came with 3:30 left.
This was the first of three Ottawa-Carolina meetings this season, though the other two aren't scheduled until April.
--Field Level Media