Anderson has 32 saves as Senators' beat Hurricanes

[April 17, 2013]  OTTAWA (AP) -- Craig Anderson made 32 saves to help the Ottawa Senators beat the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Tuesday night for their third straight win.

Mika Zibanejad, Cory Conacher and Chris Neil all scored as Ottawa remained in sixth place in the Eastern Conference, one point ahead of the New York Islanders.

Justin Faulk and Eric Staal scored for the Hurricanes, who got 31 saves from Justin Peters.

The Senators returned to Ottawa from Boston amid tightened security measures a day after the bombings at the Boston marathon. Their game against the Bruins, postponed Monday, was rescheduled for April 28.

Ottawa defenseman Jared Cowen played his first game since undergoing hip surgery in November that was expected to end his season.

He knocked Carolina forward Jeff Skinner out of the game with a clean hit at center ice 13 minutes into the first period. Cowen immediately fought Chad LaRose, who came to Skinner's defense and received 17 minutes of penalties in the process.

Cowen then fought Kevin Westgarth in the second period after Westgarth drew an initial roughing penalty.

Ottawa had its best opportunities in the first period and those chances came early. Kyle Turris and Conacher each had partial breakaways in the opening minutes but were unable to convert.

Jean-Gabriel Pageau, playing just his third career game and first in Ottawa, broke down the right side of the ice and cut in front of the Carolina goal but was stopped by Peters.

Later in the period, Peters got his glove on a shot from Sergei Gonchar while the Senators were on their first power play of the game.

Zibanejad got the Senators on the scoreboard first, converting a pass from Coacher with 2:38 remaining in the first period.

The Senators increased their lead at 6:00 of the second period on Michalek's snap shot that beat Peters on the far side.

The lead was back to one however, exactly 4 minutes later as Anderson got some, but not enough, of Faulk's shot from the slot.

After some pressure from the Hurricanes, the Senators broke out on a 2-on-1 that ended with Neil redirecting a pass from Guillaume Latendresse past Peters at the edge of the Carolina crease with 2:48 left in the second.

Staal scored a power-play goal with 3 1/2 minutes left in the third, but that was as close as the Hurricanes got.

NOTES: Senators C Peter Regin celebrated his 27th birthday. ... Ottawa C Kyle Turris remained one point shy of 100 for his career. ... Hurricanes D Joe Corvo is one point away from 300 in his career. ... Ottawa has a 7-5-1 record against the Southeast Division this season while the Hurricanes are 8-7-0 against the Northeast. ... Carolina and Ottawa began the day ranked 1-2 in the NHL in shots per game at 32.8 and 32.4, respectively.

[Associated Press]

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