Luukkonen makes 29 saves, Sabres defeat Hurricanes

BUFFALO -- Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen made 29 saves for the Buffalo Sabres in a 4-1 win against the Carolina Hurricanes at KeyBank Center on Sunday.

Luukkonen started and won for the second straight game (also a 9-3 win against the Chicago Blackhawks on Friday) after making just one appearance in Buffalo’s previous six games.

“When your name gets called you have to be ready for it,” Luukkonen said. “I think the team has been playing well in front of me, so it feels good to kind of help the team win, too.

“It’s not always optimal [to wait for a start], but sometimes you have to work through it, and we’ve been having two other goalies that have been playing well, so you have to do your thing every day as well as you can and be ready when your name is called.”

Tage Thompson extended his goal streak to six games, and Ryan McLeod had two assists for the Sabres (9-9-4), who have won four of their past five.

“It’s going to be hard games. This has to be our minimum,” Buffalo captain Rasmus Dahlin said. “This is how we have to play every night. It’s competing, it’s skating, it’s doing the little things right, work for the team. That’s got to be our bare minimum. Then we can improve some other things.”

Shayne Gostisbehere scored, and Frederik Andersen made 17 saves for the Hurricanes (14-6-2), who had their five-game point streak end (3-0-2).

Carolina played without captain Jordan Staal because of an illness.

“I’ll try to keep it PG here, not very good,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “I could feel right from the start we were just flat. No excuses, part of that schedule, long road trip, fighting the flu bug a little here. The energy was just so dead, and we played like it.”

Alex Tuch gave Buffalo a 1-0 lead on a power play at 5:51 of the first period. He was uncovered at the back door and received a pass from McLeod through the slot, which he buried into a wide-open net.

Gostisbehere’s power-play goal tied it 1-1 at 14:36. With a scramble at the crease and Luukkonen out of position, Mattias Samuelsson’s clearing attempt went to Gostisbehere, who scored from the left face-off circle.

“Just executing, getting pucks to the net, and good things will happen,” Gostisbehere said.

Jack Quinn put the Sabres ahead 2-1 at 3:55 of the second period when he took a pass from McLeod at the front of the net and directed it under the crossbar.

Beck Malenstyn pushed the lead to 3-1 with a highlight-reel individual effort at 18:36. He took a backhand feed from Tyson Kozak, then deked and jumped around Hurricanes center Sebastian Aho before putting a wrist shot under Andersen’s arm.

“I don’t think it’s successfully worked for me for about 10 years since juniors, so I’ve kept it in the back pocket just in case,” a laughing Malenstyn said.

Thompson scored for an NHL career-high sixth straight game with an empty-net goal at 19:38 of the third period for the 4-1 final. He has 12 goals in 22 games.

“I thought tonight [Luukkonen] really played great,” Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff said. “That second and third [periods], couple big opportunities. First, I thought we could’ve put the game away in the second period with all the opportunities we had. We didn’t. We kind of let them hang around. But I thought when we gave up some good looks -- and they’re a good team -- he made the save that we needed.”

The Hurricanes outshot the Sabres 13-4 in the third period.

“It was a pretty rough second for us, but come the third, give it a push, kind of a wasted effort in the sense that we need to do that from the start, not just in the third,” Gostisbehere said. “Just stop putting ourselves in a hole, giving them some easy ones.”

NOTES: Andrei Svechnikov played in his 500th NHL game. The forward had five shots on goal in 19:35 of ice time. … Buffalo forward Zach Benson played 16:56 and had an assist in his return to the lineup after missing 10 games with a lower-body injury.