Laine has hat trick, Canadiens cruise past Sabres

MONTREAL -- Patrik Laine scored three power-play goals, and the Montreal Canadiens dealt the Buffalo Sabres their 11th straight loss with a 6-1 win at Bell Centre on Tuesday.

Laine has scored six goals, all on the power play, in seven games since making his season and Canadiens debut on Dec. 3.

“If you take away the goals, I’ve had a million times better games than that where I’ve had zero goals,” Laine said. “On the power play, it went in, but outside of that I would call it a pretty average performance from myself today, but that was enough.”

Juraj Slafkovsky had a goal and an assist, and Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield and Lane Hutson each had two assists for Montreal (12-16-3), which moved one point ahead of Buffalo into seventh place in the Atlantic Division. Sam Montembeault made 20 saves.

Suzuki and Hutson each has five assists on Laine’s goals.

“He handcuffed the goalie really good,” Suzuki said. “I think he went short side twice and then threw him a changeup far side. And it’s tough when he can shoot it from anywhere.”

Dylan Cozens scored for the Sabres (11-17-4), who are 0-8-3 during the skid and have not won since Nov. 23.

“I think, as a man, we’ve got to look at ourselves in the mirror and regroup,” Buffalo forward Ryan McLeod said. “I think there’s lots of season left, and we’re still not that far out of it. We’ve just got to find a way to get a win next game.”

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen made 15 saves on 21 shots through the first two periods. James Reimer replaced him to start the third and made six saves.

Buffalo’s loss came one day after team owner Terry Pegula flew to Montreal to address the team.

Sabres defenseman Connor Clifton was at a loss to explain the team’s response.

“I don’t know, really, just no legs, no jump, no energy,” Clifton said. “Yeah, you think obviously with the meeting yesterday, the 10-game losing streak, at least we’d have the legs and energy.”

Joel Armia scored 19 seconds into the first period to give the Canadiens a 1-0 lead. He scored on Montreal’s first shot after Buffalo defenseman Mattias Samuelsson deflected Jake Evans’ shot attempt and the puck bounced out front off the end boards.

“We started that fourth line to get the puck in deep and try to create some energy right off the bat,” Sabres coach Lindy Ruff said. “And we get a tough break going the other way and all of a sudden we gave them energy. And I think that fueled them right off the bat, which didn’t allow us, really, (to) get in the game.”

Laine made it 2-0 with a power-play goal at 6:26, one-timing a slap shot from the left face-off dot on a pass from Suzuki.

Cozens cut it to 2-1 at 3:43 when he scored on a wrist shot from the top of the slot after driving up the middle to take JJ Peterka’s pass from the left point.

Slafkovsky put Montreal up 3-1 at 5:54, banking a rebound of Caufield’s shot in off Luukkonen from behind the goal line.

“It was a nice play by him to read the goalie off his post and bank it in,” Suzuki said. “He’s been working hard, coming into the rink every day trying to get better and doing the right things over and over again, and I’m happy that he got rewarded.”

Laine followed that with two straight 5-on-3 power-play goals 1:10 apart, also one-timed slap shots from the left face-off circle.

He made it 4-1 at 9:45 when he scored stick side on Luukkonen on Suzuki’s no-look backhand pass.

Laine scored his third power-play goal at 10:55 to push it to 5-1. He one-timed Caufield’s pass for his 11th NHL hat trick.

“Five-on-3 is a little bit different since there’s just so much open ice,” Laine said. “And I think when you have the kind of unit we have, and if we get over a minute, 5-on-3, it should be an automatic goal.”

Josh Anderson made it 6-1 at 19:15 when he scored from the left edge of the crease.

NOTES: Laine passed Mikko Rantanen of the Colorado Avalanche for the third-most hat tricks by a Finland-born player. Jari Kurri had 23 hat tricks, one more than fellow Hall of Fame member Teemu Selanne. … Laine, who also played for the Winnipeg Jets and Columbus Blue Jackets, is the eighth active player to score a hat trick with at least three teams, joining David Perron, Jordan Eberle, Kyle Palmieri, Ryan O'Reilly, Tyler Toffoli, Frank Vatrano and Artemi Panarin. … Hutson has 22 points (one goal, 21 assists) in 31 games. He became the second-fastest Canadiens rookie defenseman to reach 20 assists; Chris Chelios got his 20th assist in his 30th game in 1984-85.