What a win for the Columbus Blue Jackets on Thursday night.
Six different goal scorers combined for the 6-4 win over the Buffalo Sabres as the Blue Jackets claimed their first victory on home ice.
Two nights following the home opener against the Florida Panthers and honoring the memory of the Gaudreau brothers, the team treated Thursday's game against the Sabres as a home opener with the traditional festivities and team introductions.
Cole Sillinger left the game in the first period but returned.
Kent Johnson Injured
Johnson left Thursday's game early in the second period with an upper-body injury after he tripped over James van Riemsdyk and did not return.
Oh no. Kent Johnson trips over JVR after van Riemsdyk is hauled down for a penalty. Johnson goes to the room. Looked like a wrist maybe. #CBJ
— Jeff Svoboda (@JacketsInsider) October 18, 2024
The Blue Jackets are holding their collective breaths.
Kent Johnson trips over van Riemsdyk almost in the same spot where Gudbranson and Monahan went down. Johnson down the tunnel as soon as he skated off, holding left hand. Not good.#CBJ
— Brian Hedger (@BrianHedger) October 18, 2024
Already missing Boone Jenner, Dmitri Voronkov, Erik Gudbranson, and Elvis Merzlikins to injury, a significant injury for Johnson would be a crushing blow, already coming off the torn labrum and with how hot he's been to start the season.
Well see how he is tomorrow, but as I said with Goody (Erik Gudbranson), it didnt look good but well get the evaluation tomorrow.
— 1st Ohio Battery (@1stOhioBattery) October 18, 2024
-Head coach Dean Evason when asked about the injury to Kent Johnson. #CBJ
Johnson (two goals, three assists) stretched his point streak to four games with an assist on Yegor Chinakhov's first-period power-play goal at 5:12 to start the scoring.
Chinakhov has points in all four games (two goals, four assists), joining Johnson.
Fire the cannon!
— Bally Sports Columbus (@BallySportsCBUS) October 17, 2024
Yegor Chinakhov has points in all four games so far this season!#CBJ
Bally Sports Ohio
https://t.co/fG9FCEmnxA
Bally Sports app pic.twitter.com/vGRr0TS7mH
Johnson was elevated to the second line to start the game with van Riemsdyk and Adam Fantilli. Justin Danforth made his season debut on the third line.
Offensive Firepower
The Blue Jackets continue to be an entertaining watch under head coach Dean Evason.
It's the fourth game of the season and #CBJ has scored six goals twice already. I find this entertaining.
— Jeff Svoboda (@JacketsInsider) October 18, 2024
In Thursday's win, 11 players cracked the scoresheet with at least one point, including six different goal scorers. Four players had multi-point efforts.
| Blue Jackets Scorers | Goals | Assists |
| Zach Aston-Reese | 1 | 0 |
| Yegor Chinakhov | 1 | 0 |
| Adam Fantilli | 1 | 0 |
| Kent Johnson | 0 | 1 |
| Kirill Marchenko | 1 | 1 |
| Mathieu Olivier | 1 | 1 |
| Cole Sillinger | 0 | 1 |
| Jake Christiansen | 0 | 2 |
| Ivan Provorov | 0 | 1 |
| Damon Severson | 1 | 0 |
| Zach Werenski | 0 | 2 |
Mathieu Olivier had two points with a goal and an assist and Columbus also had goals by Chinakhov, Kirill Marchenko, Fantilli, Zach Aston-Reese, and Damon Severson.
Zach Werenski and Jake Christiansen each had two assists. Ivan Provorov and Sillinger notched assists.
Aston-Reese made history with his first Blue Jackets goal.
Aston-Reese's goal at 15 seconds is tied for the 4th-fastest goal to start a 3rd period in #CBJ history and tied for 12th-fastest to start a period overall.
— CBJ Public Relations (@BlueJacketsPR) October 18, 2024
Two-For-Two For Tarry
Merzlikins did not play due to an upper-body injury so it was up to Daniil Tarasov to contain the Sabres.
The 25-year-old made 20 saves to pick up his 14th career win and the second win for the Blue Jackets this season. He was also in net for last Saturday's 6-4 victory over the Colorado Avalanche.
Tarasov had it easy to start, relatively speaking, as the Sabres were held without a shot more than halfway through the first period.
Then things got a little more hairy in the second period as the teams got into a back-and-forth scoring match. The Sabres outscored Columbus 3-2 in the second period with the final three goals of the period coming in 2:06 and five goals in 10:01 overall.
"You can still be really good offensively but you have to be in the proper position to not be bad defensively," Evason said. "Our group, we challenged them in between the second period, to do those things, the right things.
"You can't cheat the game ... this league is too good to cheat and be on the wrong side and give up those easy odd-man rushes because we're not doing the right thing. But we did the right thing. Hopefully the reinforcement with our chat after and our video presentation will allow them to realize we can score but we can't give up what we gave up in the second period."
Rematch
The Blue Jackets continue their four-game homestand with an opening night rematch against the Minnesota Wild on Saturday, Oct. 19 at 7:00 p.m. ET from Nationwide Arena. The Wild won the first game 3-2.
