Sebastian Aho's 3-point game leads Hurricanes past Senators 4-1, snapping a 4-game losing streak

OTTAWA, Ontario -- — Sebastian Aho had two goals and an assist to lead the Carolina Hurricanes to a 4-1 win over the Ottawa Senators on Tuesday night.

Matin Necas and Seth Jarvis also scored for Carolina, which scored three goals in the second period and snapped a four-game skid.

“I think we were just a little more dialed in,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “You know, obviously, it’s such a fine line from winning and losing and doing the little things right, which I thought we did here tonight for the most part and then you get pucks to go in.”

Aho credited the play of goalie Pyotr Kochetkov, who made 31 saves.

“He made some huge saves,” Aho said. “He kept us in the game, especially early on. It was just a great game by him and hopefully he can build some confidence off this.”

Josh Norris scored for the Senators, who had their three-game winning streak halted. Joonas Korpisalo stopped 24 shots.

Norris called the second period “pretty embarrassing,” while coach D.J. Smith said it may have been the worst period his team has played this season.

“Just not hard enough, not desperate enough to keep the puck out of the net,” Smith said. “If you’re not bang-on in the NHL, you won’t win. And that second period, that’s probably our worst period of the year, I thought, from a compete level for the amount of chances.

“We gave up breakaways and what have you. You’re not going to win if you play like that.”

Ottawa plays five of its next seven games on the road and Brady Tkachuk said the Senators needed to learn from the loss.

“You never want to come out with that performance in that second period there,” Tkachuk said. “Definitely a lot to be learned from this game. Now we’ve got a huge road trip coming up for us, so it’s time to step up and dial it in.”

The Senators opened the scoring seven minutes in, when Norris tipped in a shot by Erik Brannstrom.

Carolina tied the game with a power-play goal with 1:11 left in the period. Brady Skeji made a great pass to Necas, who beat Korpisalo on the short side.

Aho gave Carolina the lead with a power-play goal on a shot from the point at 12:18 of the second period. He picked up an assist 81 seconds later when Jarvis beat Korpisalo.

Aho added another goal at 17:19, taking advantage of poor defensive coverage and going in uncontested to score his 10th goal of the season.

Down by three to start the third period, Ottawa pressed to get back in the game, but Kochetkov was solid. He stopped Drake Batherson, who was playing his 250th career game, on a breakaway midway through the period, and also stopped Brady Tkachuk on a penalty shot late in the game.

Tkachuk was awarded the penalty shot after officials whistled Kochetkov for thowing his stick to make a save.

Ottawa was 0 for 4 on the power play and slipped to 0 for 18 on the power play in its last five home games.

“Tonight, we got a little frustrated,” Smith said. “We had a couple looks early and it didn’t go in. But that’s a really good penalty killing team, so you can’t get frustrated. They’re one of the top (teams) in the league every year.”

Hurricanes forward Andrei Svechnikov will be sidelined for the foreseeable future due to an upper-body injury, the team said.

UP NEXT

Hurricanes: At Detroit Red Wings on Thursday in the finale of a six-game trip.

Senators: At St. Louis Blues on Thursday in the opener of a five-game trip.

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AP NHL: https://www.apnews.com/hub/NHL