Hurricanes jump out to 5-goal lead, cruise past Sabres

Sebastian Aho scored twice in the Carolina Hurricanes' 6-2 win over the visiting Buffalo Sabres on Saturday.

Teuvo Teravainen had a goal and an assist, and Andrei Svechnikov, Martin Necas, Brent Burns and Jaccob Slavin each had two assists for the Hurricanes, who have won five of their past seven games. Pyotr Kochetkov made 21 saves.

Casey Mittelstadt and Tyson Jost scored, and Eric Comrie made 30 saves for the Sabres, who have lost two straight games. Forward Jordan Greenway left the game after the first period with an upper-body injury.

Aho put Carolina ahead 1-0 at 15:26 of the first period. Seth Jarvis sent a short backhand feed to Aho coming over the blue line and the center skated to the edge of the right circle before firing a shot that beat Comrie glove side.

Jack Drury doubled the lead just over a minute later. Necas carried the puck up along the right side and around the back of the net and then passed to Drury for a one-time shot low in the left circle. Comrie made the save but the rebound went back to Drury, who made quick work of it for a 2-0 advantage at 16:36.

Aho took advantage of a power play to push it to 3-0 at 1:06 of the second period. Andrei Svechnikov sent a short pass from the top of the left circle to Aho in the high slot to send it past Comrie, who was screened by Buffalo defenseman Erik Johnson, just 13 seconds into the man advantage.

Noesen extended it to 4-0 at 14:12. Necas was first on a high pass attempt by Slavin and got behind the Sabres defense, skating to the net before dropping a pass for a trailing Noesen, who easily deposited it into the net with Comrie sprawled to the side.

Teravainen, uncovered down low, took a cross-ice pass from Svechnikov at the left point and lifted it high over Comrie on the power play for a 5-0 lead at 18:04.

Mittelstadt was first to a long pass by Henri Jokiharju and scored far side from the right circle to cut it to 5-1 at 4:08 of the third period.

Brady Skjei's short-handed goal off the faceoff made it 6-1 at 8:05.

Jost narrowed it to 6-2 from in front at 9:24.

—Field Level Media