Arizona’s first major road trip was a big success. It looks as if the Coyotes learned from what happened last season.
Nick Schmaltz on Monday scored in a shoot-out to help the Coyotes beat the Buffalo Sabres 3-2.
Conor Garland and Carl Soderberg scored for Arizona in regulation. Darcy Kuemper made 24 saves and stopped all three Sabres attempts in the shoot-out.
Photo: AP
The Coyotes (7-3-1) closed out a 3-1 road trip, also beating the Rangers and Devils, but losing to the New York Islanders on Thursday last week.
“We had a trip like this at the end of the year that kind of cost us the playoff spot, so all these trips are going to be important,” Garland said. “They’re hard trips for any team going out east or coming out west, so to go 3-1, that’s a big-time road trip.”
Schmaltz scored the game-winner on a low shot to the glove side.
“We knew this was a big trip,” Kuemper said. “You want to separate a little bit early. It’s early in the season, but these points are huge and we’ve just got to stick with it.”
The Coyotes dominated the final part of the game, outshooting the Sabres 30-15 over the final two periods.
Both teams had prime scoring opportunities in overtime.
The Sabres hit the post twice, while Arizona’s Clayton Keller nearly found himself with an empty net after Hutton mishandled the puck.
Buffalo’s Casey Mittelstadt also missed an open corner of the net on a late backhand-shot when the puck jumped on him at the last second.
“I think we got a lot of bounces early in the year,” Mittelstadt said. “It’s gonna find a way to even itself out a little bit, but I think for myself I’ve got to put one of those in for sure.”
Jack Eichel and Jeff Skinner scored for Buffalo (9-2-2), who had won four of five games.
Carter Hutton made 41 saves.
“We got off to a good start, things seemed to be ticking well, and then our energy level, we seemed to be digging deep the whole rest of the game,” Sabres coach Ralph Krueger said. “We fell back on our heels.”
Eichel opened the scoring with his seventh goal 3 minutes, 31 seconds into the game, ripping a hard power-play shot from the left circle after a Sabres faceoff win.
Skinner made it 2-0 when he finished a terrific give-and-go sequence. Marcus Johansson got the puck back to Skinner, who converted a one-timer for his seventh goal of the season at 11:16.
The Coyotes got on the board just before the end of the first period thanks to a bad-angle goal from Garland. Stationed near the Sabres end line, Garland snuck the puck past Hutton on the short side with 1:10 remaining.
After a series of impressive saves by Hutton in the second period, including a stop on Christian Dvorak from point-blank range, Arizona evened the score on the power play with 3:28 remaining.
A tipped puck deflected high into the air, fell onto Hutton’s back and went into the net. Soderberg was credited with the goal.
In Vancouver, J.T. Miller had two goals as the Canucks scored five times in the first period on their way to a 7-2 victory over the Florida Panthers.
Vancouver got on the board less than two minutes in and kept up offensive pressure that overwhelmed the Panthers much of the game.
Josh Leivo had a goal and an assist for the Canucks. Brandon Sutter, Tim Schaller, Jake Virtanen and Brock Boeser also scored. Alex Edler and Elias Pettersson contributed three assists apiece.
Brian Boyle and Mike Hoffman scored for Florida, but the loss snapped an eight-game point streak (4-0-4).
Canucks goalie Thatcher Demko made his fourth start of the season and stopped 27 shots.
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