The Blue Jackets won their second preseason contest in as many nights, pulling away to a 6-3 victory over Buffalo on Saturday night at Nationwide Arena.
Game in a Paragraph
A game Buffalo team composed of largely prospects and AHLer hung in there for a while, but the Blue Jackets used a third-period explosion to pull away. Columbus scored five straight goals, four of them in 4:24 of the final frame and three in just 1:15, to improve to 3-1 in the preseason.
Quote of the Game
Sean Monahan: “We just stayed patient. I don’t think we were playing great by no means, but we generated some turnovers, got some looks and capitalized there in the third. Big comeback win. We’ll take it.”
CBJ Standouts
- Monahan scored two goals in his preseason debut with the Blue Jackets.
- Kent Johnson had a pair of primary assists and now has four points in two preseason games.
- Adam Fantilli scored his fourth goal in the past two games.
- James van Riemsdyk, Jake Christiansen and Cole Sillinger also tallied for the Jackets.
How It Happened
There were plenty of chances each way in the first period, but Buffalo was the only team to get on the board as a familiar face scored for the Sabres. With the Sabres on the power play, former CBJ forward Josh Dunne was at the netfront and deflected a pass from Noah Ostlund past Elvis Merzlikins at 14:56 to make it a 1-0 game.
Buffalo extended the lead to 2-0 at 9:19 of the second on a nice transition play, with Ostlund again setting it up. The 20-year-old Swede got the puck on the rush and dropped it to the trailer, Zach Metsa, whose shot deflected off Damon Severson and got by Merzlikins. The Blue Jackets kept pushing, though, and finally got on the board with 2:11 left in the frame as a series of extended pressure ended with van Riemsdyk taking a feed from Kirill Marchenko at the post and shoveling a shot past goalie Felix Sandstrom.
The Blue Jackets then scored four times in the opening 11 minutes of the third to take the lead. Monahan started the party on the power play at 6:19, redirecting Johnson’s shot-pass from the right wall past Sandstrom from in front. Columbus then scored twice in 22 seconds at 9:28 and 9:50, first when Monahan converted Marchenko’s cross-ice feed from a sharp angle and then when Christiansen one-timed Johnson’s pass past Sandstrom. The barrage wasn’t over, though, as Fantilli fired Yegor Chinakhov’s pass from the left circle at 10:43 to make it a 5-2 contest. Mason Jobst tallied with 6:14 left for Buffalo before Sillinger set the final score with an empty-net goal.
Notable
Elvis Merzlikins played the entire 60 minutes and made 28 saves on 31 shots against. ... Columbus outshot the Sabres by a 43-31 margin. ... Marchenko had a pair of assists. ... Of the 18 skaters for the Blue Jackets, 12 of them had points. ... Columbus had a 27-9 edge in hits, with Owen Sillinger and Mathieu Olivier tied for the team lead with five. ... Christiansen and Johnson each had six shots on goal.
Roster Report
Here is the roster the Blue Jackets used for the contest. The Blue Jackets dressed an NHL-caliber lineup that included the preseason debuts of Monahan, Boone Jenner and Zach Werenski.
Up Next
Columbus is set to practice Sunday and then welcomes Washington to Nationwide Arena for another preseason content Monday at 7 p.m.
