O'Reilly has hat trick, assist in Maple Leafs win against Sabres

BUFFALO -- Ryan O'Reilly scored a hat trick and had an assist for the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 6-3 win against the Buffalo Sabres at KeyBank Center on Tuesday.

The three goals were the first for O'Reilly in three games since Toronto acquired the center from the St. Louis Blues with center Noel Acciari on Friday in a three-team trade that included the Minnesota Wild.
"Yeah, definitely feels a little better than other buildings, for sure," said O'Reilly, who played for Buffalo for three seasons before being traded to St. Louis on July 1, 2018, in the deal that sent forward Tage Thompson to the Sabres. "Just to get on the board like that, to contribute tonight, get the first one out of the way … it's a good feeling right now. Throughout the game, obviously it would've been nice to just shut the door and not let them get back into it. But you know, a win's a win."

John Tavares had a goal and three assists, and Mitchell Marner had five assists for the Maple Leafs (35-15-8), who have won four of their past six games. Ilya Samsonov made 29 saves.
"Overall, I thought we did a good job of really not giving up a whole lot through the game," Marner said. "When we did, 'Sammy' made some unreal saves for us as usual."
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen allowed four goals on 10 shots for the Sabres (28-23-4) before he was replaced by Craig Anderson (17 saves). Alex Tuch had a goal and an assist for Buffalo, which is 2-4-1 in its past seven.
"This was not on 'UPL' just so we're clear on that," Buffalo coach Don Granato said. "That change was made because we didn't have the start. They had jump at the start and we didn't. It was one of those nights where you could see we weren't processing things well. I thought that was the case through the entire game. We didn't look sharp. We didn't feel sharp. We had to battle within ourselves and we challenged them quite a bit on the coaching side."
O'Reilly gave Toronto a 1-0 lead at 3:51 of the first period after taking a diagonal pass from Marner in the slot. He made it 2-0 just 37 seconds later when he lifted a backhand over Luukkonen's glove off another pass from Marner at 4:28.
Tavares scored on a rebound in front to push it to 3-0 at 7:14, leading to the Sabres calling a timeout.
"They were simple, they were hard, they were moving their feet," Tuch said. "We got a little bit too lazy and we just weren't playing our game at all. Like you said, horrendous start. Back on our heels, just mistakes, and that's a team that's, I mean, that's an offensive super team. They've got a lot of star power over there. You're going to make defensive mistakes, you're going to allow time and space, they're going to capitalize on it and they did so."

Michael Bunting made it 4-0 at 12:09 by scoring to the short side from low in the left face-off circle, chasing Luukkonen.
"When you have a period like we did and you grab control of the game on the road like we did, you're not going to get too critical of the rest of the game from there," Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. "That said, while there's a great sample of what it is supposed to look like and what we are capable of, there's still plenty in there in the second half of the game that shows why we need to stay on our habits, our details all the way through regardless of score or opponent."
William Nylander extended it to 5-0 on the power play at 14:36 of the second period with a shot from the left side.

Jack Quinn cut it to 5-1 at 5:12 of the third period on a wrist shot from the right circle, and Tuch pulled Buffalo within 5-2 at 8:01 from the bottom of the right circle to the far side.
Jeff Skinner made it 5-3 at 16:29 from the top of the left circle.
"I thought we still can take a little bit away from the third period, but we dug ourselves too big of a hole," Tuch said. "So, we have to go back to the drawing board and figure out what we did wrong at the start of the game."
O'Reilly scored into an empty net at 18:50 for the 6-3 final.
NOTES: Marner tied Pep Kelly (March 14, 1940, at the Montreal Canadiens), Babe Pratt (Dec. 17, 1942, at Montreal) and Borje Salming (Dec. 16, 1977, at the Minnesota North Stars) for the most assists in a road game in Toronto history. … Marner has 51 assists, reaching 50 in a season for the fourth time in his NHL career, the third-most in Maple Leafs history behind Darryl Sittler (six times) and Salming (five times). … O'Reilly (two goals, assist), Marner (three assists) and Tavares (goal, two assists) each had three points in the first period, marking the first time three Toronto players have done it. … The Maple Leafs scored their fastest four goals at the start of a road game since scoring four in 8:17 on Oct. 27, 1989, also at the Sabres. … Tuch's goal was the 100th of his NHL career in his 360th game.