Hurricanes Shut Out Columbus for 40 Minutes, Survive Late Scare

Carolina held Columbus scoreless through the first 40 minutes and 16 seconds, building a 3-0 lead before the Blue Jackets made things uncomfortable in a hurry. Final: CAR 3, CBJ 2.

Carolina controlled the game's tempo from the jump. Jordan Martinook opened the scoring at 15:51 of the first period — a wrist shot set up by Seth Jarvis and Jaccob Slavin — and that first goal looks, in hindsight, like the one that mattered most, shifting the margin from even to 1-0 in Carolina's favor and never relinquishing it. Logan Stankoven added his ninth of the season on a snap shot at 7:47 of the second, assisted by Nikolaj Ehlers and Jackson Blake, pushing it to 2-0. Columbus generated 26 shots on Pyotr Kochetkov, but couldn't solve him through two periods.

Then came the third, and it got strange fast. Just 16 seconds in — before most fans had settled back into their seats — Mark Jankowski snapped home his seventh of the year off assists from Jarvis and Jalen Chatfield to make it 3-0. That appeared to be the dagger. It wasn't. Denton Mateychuk got Columbus on the board at 6:56 with his fourth goal of the season, a snap shot assisted by Jake Christiansen and Sean Monahan. Less than three minutes later, Kent Johnson deflected home his seventh — assisted by Charlie Coyle and Zach Werenski — and suddenly it was 3-2 with plenty of time left. The Blue Jackets had scored twice in under three minutes after going two-plus periods without a goal. That's the kind of sequence that unravels teams.

Carolina held on. Kochetkov finished with 24 saves on 26 shots, and the story of the night was Seth Jarvis, who picked up two assists — his third and fourth of the season — to pace the Hurricanes offensively. On the other side, Jet Greaves made 24 saves on 27 shots for Columbus, and the numbers were nearly identical between the two goaltenders. The difference was the first 40 minutes, when Carolina was the only team that could find the net. Columbus looks like a team with some fight — two goals in under three minutes in the third is not nothing — but digging a 3-0 hole against a team like Carolina is a tough ask to climb out of, and tonight they came up one short.