Winning Thoughts: Blue Jackets offense too much for Sabres

After CBJ wins, we'll give three takeaways about what stood out or what we'll remember from the Blue Jackets victory.

BLUE JACKETS 6, SABRES 4

1. Are you not entertained?

For the first time in Blue Jackets history, Columbus has scored at least six goals twice in the first four games of the season. Following in the footsteps of Saturday’s 6-4 win at Colorado, the Blue Jackets have already shown they can be an explosive outfit, with six different CBJ players scoring in each of those games.

So where has the offense come from? You can point to a lot of factors, including the fact the Blue Jackets have a bunch of talented players, from veterans who can put the puck in the net to youngsters starting to feel a groove to defensemen who aren’t afraid to jump in the play. In all, 11 different players have already scored through the first four games.

Add in a little confidence and a system that encourages attacking play, and you have a team that has shown it can put some points on the board in the early going.

“I think we’re holding pucks down low in the offensive zone more, we’re finding little seams, we’re making plays, we’re playing simple hockey in our D-zone, we’re getting the puck out, and that’s allowing us to score on the rush,” Cole Sillinger said. “I think we have a lot of offensive lines. Our D like to jump up and make reads that way.

“We always knew we could score goals, it’s just nice to get rewarded right now.”

2. But it has to come the right way.

To a man, the Blue Jackets talked postgame about how the offense has to come from solid defensive structure, which is something Columbus had for most of Thursday night’s win.

Most of it. Columbus rarely let Buffalo have the puck in the first period, but things turned into a bit of a track meet in the second frame. Buffalo scored three times in the middle period to turn what had been a 2-0 lead after one into a much more precarious 4-3 advantage after 40 minutes.

When Columbus got back to the locker room after the second period, head coach Dean Evason made his point clear – the offense was flowing, but it had to flow from solid defensive play.

The result? Game-sealing goals from Zach Aston-Reese and Damon Severson in the third that came from establishing a forecheck and then creating off of it.

“The two goals in the second period, we gave them because we are on the wrong side of the player or the puck, whatever (it may be),” Evason said. “We call it the Blue Jackets side. You can still be really good offensively, but you have to be in the proper position to not be bad defensively.

“Our group, we challenged them in between the second period to do the right things. We went in there (in the third), they scored a 6-on-5 goal, but we scored two goals because we were doing the right things, we were on the right side.”

3. The top line was dominant again

We’ll write more about this in the coming days, because how can you not?

It was another night where the top trio of Yegor Chinakhov on the left, Sean Monahan in the middle and Kirill Marchenko on the right got the job done. That trio worked to put three more goals on the board, with Chinakhov kicking things off with a power-play marker, Marchenko adding a tally late in the first period and then Marchenko setting up Severson for the 6-3 tally in the third.

While they finally ceded a goal for the first time this season – Buffalo won an offensive zone draw and then got a tip-in tally from rookie Jiri Kulich in the second – that trio again had massive advantages in shot attempts (19-5), shots on goal (9-3) and expected goals (0.70-0.25) at 5-on-5 per Natural Stat Trick.

When asked about the game what he likes about the trio, Evason had a simple answer.

“Everything,” he said.

OK, he expanded on it a little bit, but we'll save that for another day.