Hurricanes hand Senators eighth straight loss

OTTAWA --The Ottawa Senators lost their eighth straight game, 5-4 to the Carolina Hurricanes at Canadian Tire Centre on Sunday.

"Every day is a new day," Senators coach Guy Boucher said. "I never change my approach and I'm not going to change it whether you win eight in a row or you've lost eight. Every day is a new day. You've got some different players in your lineup, you're playing a different team and it's a different opportunity."
Matt Duchene, Ryan Dzingel, Rudolfs Balcers and Jean-Gabriel Pageau scored for Ottawa (15-23-5), which is 0-7-1 in its past eight games. Marcus Hogberg allowed three goals on 16 shots before being pulled in the second period. He was replaced by Anders Nilsson, who made 11 saves.
WATCH: [All Hurricanes vs. Senators highlights]
Brock McGinn and Justin Faulk each had a goal and an assist, Teuvo Teravainen and Sebastian Aho each had two assists, and Petr Mrazek made 27 saves for Carolina (19-17-5), which has won four in a row.
"When you're winning, you're feeling good," Hurricanes defenseman Dougie Hamilton said. "Scoring goals helps with confidence. Everyone's feeling good and you just go out there and play. You don't have to analyze everything and try to figure out what's wrong and talk about what's wrong all the time.
"We haven't really practiced or pregame skated that much lately. We're just playing and in a rhythm and doing well."
Faulk gave the Hurricanes a 1-0 lead 1:12 into the first period when his slap shot from the point made it through traffic on the power play. McGinn scored shorthanded with a backhand on a breakaway to make it 2-0 at 4:28.

Duchene scored on a one-timer off a cross-crease pass from Bobby Ryan to cut it to 2-1 at 2:32 of the second period.
Jaccob Slavin scored with a slap shot short side from the top of the left circle to make it 3-1 at 6:13, but Dzingel skated across the slot and scored with a backhand on the power play to cut it to 3-2 at 12:17.
Hamilton used Senators defenseman Cody Ceci as a screen and scored with a wrist shot to give Carolina a 4-2 lead at 14:54.
"I feel better," Hamilton said. "I injured myself at the start of November and that kind of hampered me. Starting to feel better and [scoring] is helping. It's nice to see it go in."
Balcers scored his first NHL goal to cut it to 4-3 at 19:12, and Pageau, who was making his season debut (Achilles), scored eight seconds later to tie it 4-4.
The two goals in eight seconds tied a Senators record with Jason Spezza and Daniel Alfredsson, who did it against the Toronto Maple Leafs on Oct. 8, 2011.

"[Balcers and Pageau] came in and made a difference for us and gave us a chance," Boucher said. "It was fun to actually feel like you've got four lines that were going good. I felt all four lines gave us something."
Justin Williams deflected Teravainen's initial shot in front on the power play to make it 5-4 at 7:34 of the third period.
"Good teams pick each other up," Williams said. "Mrazek came in after (second period) and he's like, 'That's on me.' We instantly said 'no, no, no, you've had our back all the time, it's time for us to pick you up.'
"The guys up top - the three, Aho and Teravainen and Faulk - they really seem to work it around very well (on the power play). Once you can attack from both sides, it's tough to defend."

They said it

"Our [defense] is supposed to be our strong part of our team. Everyone on our [defense] can score goals and get in on the rush and make plays. When the forwards use us, we're just trying to make the most of it. … It's effective when you can use everyone on the ice." -- Hurricanes defenseman Dougie Hamilton
"I can't tell you why the pucks are suddenly going in, because we're probably actually creating less overall scoring chances, but, I mean, we'll take it." -- Hurricanes coach Rod Brind'Amour
"[The game] was fast. The few first shifts I was shorter than I expected. It's hard to prepare at this level. It doesn't matter how hard you go into practices or how hard you're working out, it's totally different when you come into a game like that, midseason." -- Senators forward Jean-Gabriel Pageau

Need to know

It was the first time that three defensemen scored in the same game for Carolina since March 21, 2009 (Anton Babchuk, Joe Corvo and Joni Pitkanen).

What's next

Hurricanes:At the New York Islanders on Tuesday (Nassau Coliseum; 7 p.m. ET; MSG+, FS-CR, NHL.TV)
Senators:At the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday (10 p.m. ET; PRIME, TSN5, RDS, NHL.TV)