Sabres embarrass Oilers in win
LOPSIDED VICTORY: O’Reilly gets four points as injury-plagued Buffalo earns first victory of young season
EDMONTON — Ryan O’Reilly had two goals and two assists as the Buffalo Sabres won their first game of the season, pounding the Edmonton Oilers 6-2 on Sunday.
Brian Gionta also scored twice, while Kyle Okposo and Matt Moulson had the other goals for the Sabres (1-1-0).
Benoit Pouliot and Milan Lucic replied for the Oilers (2-1-0), who had won back-to-back games before the loss.
Buffalo started the scoring 2:37 into the first period as Sam Reinhart made a nice feed across to Okposo and he beat Oilers goalie Cam Talbot for his first as a Sabre.
The Sabres went up 2-0 seven minutes in, as Okposo made a great pass while on the power play to O’Reilly at the back door.
Edmonton got one back with three minutes left in the opening frame when the rebound off a Zack Kassian shot went off the leg of a hardcharging Pouliot and past Sabres goalie Robin Lehner.
The Oilers tied the game with one minute left in the period as the big rebound from a Leon Draisaitl shot came out to Lucic, who scored his first goal as an Oiler and the 400th point of his career.
Buffalo got a freebie four minutes into the second when O’Reilly took a shot just from Buffalo’s side of centre that Talbot badly misjudged and ended up tipping into his own net.
The Sabres restored their two-goal lead midway through the second when Gionta tipped in a Johan Larsson point shot, prompting Edmonton to bring in backup goalie Jonas Gustavsson, who would then end up leaving near the end of the period with an injury.
With Talbot back in net, the Sabres made it 5-2 just 37 seconds into the third. Gionta tucked a shot between Talbot’s legs on Buffalo’s 16th shot of the game.
The Sabres kept it coming with a Moulson power play goal four minutes later.
Lehner finished with 31 saves while Talbot allowed six goals on 23 shots.
Both teams return to the ice on Tuesday. The Sabres travel to Calgary while the Oilers welcome the Carolina Hurricanes.
Notes: The Sabres were without a pair of big-name players up front with centre Jack Eichel out an expected 6-8 weeks with an ankle sprain and forward Evander Kane likely out several weeks with broken ribs. Buffalo did get a boost from the return of Okposo.