Sabres crush Devils

BUFFALO — It was a day worth celebrating for the Buffalo Sabres, but quiet the opposite for the Devils.

On the team’s 50th birthday as a franchise, the Sabres scored five goals in the first period on their way to a 7-1 victory over the Devils on Monday night.

Jack Eichel notched one goal and two assists, Johan Larsson collected three assists, and Conor Sheary snapped a 19-game goal drought by scoring twice.

Rasmus Asplund, Jeff Skinner, Victor Olofsson and Henri Jokiharju also scored for Buffalo, which improved to 13-10-5. Linus Ullmark made 44 saves.

Louis Domingue was pulled from the Devil net after allowing five goals on 15 shots. He was replaced by Mackenzie Blackwood, who made 15 saves.

It was hardly the effort the Devils were looking for with a difficult four-game trip around the corner. Before that, they have a quick turnaround with a home game against Vegas tonight.

“I’m running out of things to say as to why we’re playing like that,” forward Taylor Hall said. “It’s hard. It’s a tough pill to swallow and it’s everyone in here. It’s too bad. We have the players in here to play a lot better than that. We’ve got to step it up.”

Nico Hischier got the Devils on the board 8:10 into the second with a powerplay goal. The Devils fell to 9-13-4 with the loss.

“First period was not close to being good enough in any area and obviously the scoreboard said it and it’s unacceptable,” Devils coach John Hynes said. “We’ve got to figure out particularly, like, tonight what went on in the first period and why we came out like that.”