Tavares, Maple Leafs defeat Hurricanes for third straight win

RALEIGH, N.C. -- John Tavares scored the go-ahead goal in the third period to lift the Toronto Maple Leafs to a 3-1 win against the Carolina Hurricanes at PNC Arena on Sunday.

"We had to be patient with our game," Tavares said. "We had to win a lot of battles. There wasn't much room out there for either team. Eventually, we started to create a little bit more, tilt the ice a little bit. They came hard early in the third, but we withstood that and obviously got a couple big goals."
Tavares put the Maple Leafs in front 2-1 at 8:24. Mitchell Marner gathered the puck in the right face-off circle and slipped it to Tavares, who drove to the net for his 399th NHL goal.
"[The puck was just] kind of bouncing, and lucky enough, I was able to pull it through," Marner said. "I saw Johnny going back side there. I just tried to put it in a spot where he could one-touch it in."

Calle Jarnkrok scored, and Erik Kallgren made 29 saves for the Maple Leafs (7-4-2), who have won three in a row.
"The third period, you're right there, you're in the game, you get a couple scoring opportunities," Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. "I think the win is on the backs of playing sound defensively, even when things weren't going our way."
Stefan Noesen scored for the Hurricanes (8-3-1), whose four-game winning streak ended. Frederik Andersen made 18 saves.
"Tough game," Carolina coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "I didn't think we were great, but we certainly weren't poor. We needed to capitalize on a couple chances. We had a couple good looks and we didn't score. That's the difference."

Noesen scored on the power play to put the Hurricanes up 1-0 at 8:11 of the first when he gathered a puck behind the goal line and banked it in off the back of Kallgren.
"He made a pretty good play. He was fast," Kallgren said. "I've got to be even quicker. There's skill players in this league. There's a lot of game left, you've just got to keep playing."
Jarnkrok tied it 1-1 at 18:30 of the second after receiving a pass from Pierre Engvall and scoring from the right face-off circle with a wrist shot over Andersen's blocker.
"I didn't love the second part of the second period at all," Brind'Amour said. "To me, that's what the difference in the game was. That kind of flipped it because we had the game going pretty well."

After Tavares gave Toronto the lead, William Nylander made it 3-1 at 16:25, chipping the puck past Hurricanes defenseman Jaccob Slavin and beating Andersen five-hole.
Kallgren started after Ilya Samsonov sustained a knee injury in Toronto's 2-1 win against the Boston Bruins on Saturday.
"We talked about this being a big weekend for us, especially being a back-to-back against two great teams," Marner said. "I think both games, defensively speaking, we did what we wanted to. We held our objective down there. Great weekend."
NOTES: Samsonov was placed on injured reserve and is expected to miss a week. He was injured on a successful penalty shot attempt by Brad Marchand. … Keith Petruzzelli was signed to an NHL contract to serve as the backup goalie. … Auston Matthews was held without a shot for the sixth time in his NHL career. ... Engvall's assist was his first of the season and second point. … Brind'Amour coached his 300th NHL game (182-89-29). His 182 wins are the fifth-most through the first 300 games in NHL history. … Andrei Svechnikov had an assist to extend his point streak to four games (one goal, four assists).