Hamilton, Hurricanes recover to hand Sabres another loss

BUFFALO --Dougie Hamilton scored at 2:28 of overtime, and the Carolina Hurricanes recovered for a 5-4 win against the Buffalo Sabres at KeyBank Center on Thursday.

Hamilton won it on a one-timer off a backhand pass from Martin Necas after Johan Larsson tied it 4-4 with 41 seconds remaining in regulation when Jeff Skinner's shot from along the right boards hit him and redirected in.
"Happy that off the draw we got the puck and then Necas]*
Andrei Svechnikov and Teuvo Teravainen each had a goal and two assists, and Sebastian Aho had a goal and an assist for Carolina (11-7-1), which has won 10 straight against the Sabres. Petr Mrazek made 29 saves.
Skinner had a goal and an assist, Curtis Lazar scored his first of the season, and Carter Hutton made 24 saves for Buffalo (9-6-3), which is 0-4-2 in its past six games.

"We got three power plays in the first half of the game and we weren't able to capitalize," Skinner said. "We capitalize on one of those and it's going to take a different complexion. And then I think we did a good job of sort of turning it around and getting the pressure on them and carrying that momentum sort of through the last half of the game."
Skinner scored his fifth goal in four games against his former team to give the Sabres a 1-0 lead at 4:26 of the first period, converting off a cross-ice backhand pass from Conor Sheary.
Jordan Staal tied it 1-1 at 12:07 after getting his own rebound and scoring on a shot that fluttered over Hutton's shoulder. It was his 100th goal with the Hurricanes.
"We had a good start. We felt good about the first few minutes, but the 1-1 goal really took the energy out of the group and we went flat," Sabres coach Ralph Krueger said.

Aho gave the Hurricanes a 2-1 lead on the power play at 17:17 of the first, redirecting Teravainen's pass from the right circle.
Teravainen scored 49 seconds into the second period to make it 3-1. After Jaccob Slavin's initial shot was blocked in front, Svechnikov sent a backhand pass to Aho, whose shot into an open net from the right post deflected in off Teravainen's stick.
Lazar blocked Hurricanes defenseman Haydn Fleury's shot from the point before scoring on a breakaway to cut it to 3-2 at 15:04.
"That's part of my identity, that's what I try to do," Lazar said. "If it's running someone over with a hit or blocking a shot or putting the puck in the net or doing a combination, that's what I'm going to try to do."

Henri Jokiharju tied it 3-3 at 13:35 of the third period from the slot after Ryan Dzingel couldn't handle a clearing pass from Brett Pesce, but Svechnikov gave Carolina a 4-3 lead at 16:06 with a power-play goal.
"It felt like you just never knew who was going to get that last goal," Carolina coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "I thought we had a real good game until the last little bit of the second period when they got that one; it was a bad break, really. ... All in all, it's a good two points."

They said it

"I think the game was pretty sloppy all around. Third period kind of even sloppier, I guess, and we stuck with it. I think that's the biggest thing. [Power-play goal] late, unfortunately we gave one up for them to tie it and go to overtime. We had some ups and downs in the game, but we just kept going." -- Hurricanes defenseman Dougie Hamilton
"Quite simply not enough shots. We had so much control, we're looking for the perfect goal. We need to give up that mindset to get our confidence back to be able to make those seam kind of one-timer goals that we'd like to make and get something ugly going. We're disappointed in our special teams today. We've spent the last few days working on that and speaking a lot about it. The [penalty kill] and power play need to definitely pick up steam again quickly." -- Sabres coach Ralph Krueger on the power play, which is 2-for-20 in the past eight games

Need to know

Staal and his brother, Eric, are the ninth set of brothers in NHL history to each score at least 100 goals with the same team. Eric scored 322 goals with the Hurricanes from 2003-16. … Hutton is 0-3-2 with a 3.30 goals-against average and .880 save percentage in his past five starts.

What's next

Hurricanes:At the Minnesota Wild on Saturday (2 p.m. ET; FS-N, FS-WI, FS-CR, NHL.TV)
Sabres: Host the Ottawa Senators on Saturday (7 p.m. ET; SN1, TVAS2, MSG-B, NHL.TV)