RALEIGH — The Hurricanes needed some good energy going into the 4 Nations Face-Off Tournament.
They got plenty of it Saturday against the visiting Utah Hockey Club.
Seth Jarvis had a power play goal, a shorthanded goal and single-handedly set up another goal in the second period, and fellow 4 Nations participant Sebastian Aho also scored twice as Carolina ended a three-game losing streak and entered the break with a 7-3 win at Lenovo Center.
“It’s nice to know what you’re doing is working and that it’s going to come,” said Jarvis, who had the second four-point game of his career, the other coming just over two weeks ago. “When you go on a road trip, you get one goal as a team, it’s tough. So to come back and put up seven is definitely a good way to end it.”
Jarvis gave the Hurricanes the lead for good 6:35 into the second period, scoring on a one-timer set up by Brent Burns, ending Carolina’s six-game power play drought to give the home team a 2-1 lead.
“All we’ve heard about is how bad our power play’s been, and it’s true,” Jarvis said. “So it’s nice to see one go in and have a little success there.”
Jarvis then set up two goals for Aho. He first chased down a puck attempting a breakaway, forcing Utah goalie Karel Vejmelka (31 saves) to venture out of his net. But Vejmelka’s clearing attempt was knocked down by Aho, and he slipped his way around the Utah goalie to make it 3-1 at 8:35.
Utah’s Clayton Keller cut the lead to one just under two minutes later, and then the visitors went on the power play.
But Jarvis again came through for Carolina, hopping past a Utah player to reach a puck in the corner, fighting off two defenders and centering a pass to Aho for his 20th goal of the season — a mark he’s hit in all nine of his NHL seasons.
Aho passed on a celebration, instead just pointing at his teammate after the shorthanded goal.
“That was actually an unreal play by Jarvy,” Aho said. “He just hunted the puck down and kind of beat two guys and gave me a pass for a breakaway. So that was all Jarvy.”
Jarvis then closed the period with his second goal, getting behind the Utah defense on a neutral zone faceoff and scoring on a breakaway for his 22nd of the year.
“He was the difference tonight. … They weren’t like banked in on something, they were high-end plays,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “That’s what he can do.”
The Hurricanes opened the scoring with a goal from their defense.
After breaking up a Utah rush in the defensive zone, Jalen Chatfield joined his Carolina teammates going the other way.
Andrei Svechnikov made a one-touch pass to Jordan Staal in the neutral zone to create a 2-on-1. Staal passed across to Chatfield, who shot past Vejmelka for his fifth goal of the year to make it 1-0 at 10:09 of the first.
It was just the second goal in a month for Carolina’s defense.
“His game’s gotten better and better, and he’s starting to add that, jumping into the rush,” Brind’Amour said of Chatfield. “The good defensive play, which we’ve always known, but now there’s another part to it. So he’s obviously, I think, done a nice job adding that.”
Utah tied the game on its first power play of the game.
With Burns in the penalty box for tripping, Utah forward Josh Doan avoided a Dmitry Orlov poke check by dragging the puck and snapping a shot past Pyotr Kochetkov to tie the game 1-1 at 17:35 of the opening period.
But Aho and Jarvis each scored a pair in the second, and Jordan Martinook added an empty-netter followed by Jack Roslovic’s 19th goal of the season as Carolina entered the break 33-19-4.
“It would have been tough to sit on this kind of stretch we had before this game,” Aho said. “But good thing we had another game today and got a big win.”
Notes: Mikko Rantanen did not play due to a lower-body injury. Brind’Amour said he was unsure of Rantanen’s status for the 4 Nations Face-Off but that the injury is “not serious. … Roslovic played in his 500th career game. … Jackson Blake and Andrei Svechnikov each had two assists. … Pyotr Kochetkov had 37 saves as Carolina allowed a season-high 40 shots on goal.
