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 The center converted a cross-ice pass from left winger Matt Calvert
on an odd-man rush at 1:42 of the third period for the game winner
over the Calgary Flames. Karlsson had one goal in his past 29 games
and now has six for the season.
"I haven't scored much this year so it's obviously a great feeling
to score not once, but twice," said the 23-year-old Swede.
"(The second goal) was quick fire," he added. "I didn't think much
about how much space there was, but maybe I was lucky and it went
in."
Left winger Jiri Hudler scored for Calgary (22-25-3).
The Blue Jackets (21-28-5) won four of their past five games and six
straight in Calgary.
Columbus beat the Vancouver Canucks 2-1 in a shootout the night and
head home from Western Canada feeling good before playing Tuesday.
"It was an ugly game; it was just ugly," Blue Jackets coach John
Tortorella said. "I said (during the second intermission) that we
can make it as ugly as we want here, just don't open up and give
anything for free.
"They spent some time in our end but I think we did a really good
job of keeping everything to the outside."
The teams are both in the running to land coveted American prospect
Auston Matthews as the top pick in the 2016 NHL draft. They are both
among six clubs tied with the fewest points in the NHL with 47.
The Blue Jackets continue to rely on Finnish rookie goaltender
Joonas Korpisalo in goal because of injuries to their two veterans
-- Sergei Bobrovsky and Curtis McElhinney.
With Korpisalo in goal the Blue Jackets are 4-1-1 in their past six
games.
Columbus captain Brandon Dubinsky gave Korpisalo massive praise.
"His confidence has grown and the game has slowed down so much from
his first couple starts," said the center. "He's won six of eight
games -- something like that -- and in spectacular fashion. The last
two (games) weren't easy ones."
Korpisalo made 30 stops on Friday while his Finnish countryman,
Karri Ramo, had 16 saves for the Flames.
"I didn't have many shots in the last few minutes and guys were
blocking shots. It was a pretty ugly period but we scored a goal and
got the point," Korpisalo said.
Hudler, a first-line winger, scored just his seventh goal in 43
games at 7:09 of the first, snapping a shot over Korpisalo's glove
from 15 feet out while in full stride after taking a pass from
Monahan.
Karlsson took a nice feed from defenseman Seth Jones on a rush and
banged it in to tie the game at 9:39 of the second.
The Flames bemoaned the lack of offense at home against the Eastern
Conference's weakest team.
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"They're a hard working team and they play the right way by
finishing checks and they're fast," said captain Mark Giordano, a
defenseman.
"They are a hard team to play against but if we'd eliminated some
mistakes we'd have created more odd-man rushes and when we did
create them we couldn't score."
Both Karlsson goals were the results of odd-man rushes, which Flames
head coach Bob Hartley didn't appreciate.
"Two mistakes that we need to learn from," he said. "It's part of
our process with our young group and obviously it stings. But we can
only learn from them."
Outside the other dressing room, Tortorella was happy with his
youngsters' clean game.
"There wasn't mistakes giving up glorious scoring chances like with
what happened in Vancouver the last five minutes," he said.
"A lot of good things going on with our kids. We tried to use the
whole bench. I shortened it up a bit at the end, but I thought
everyone contributed.
"We had a good weekend here."
NOTES: Out with injuries for Columbus were G Curtis McElhinney
(ankle), G Sergei Bobrovsky (groin), RW David Clarkson (upper body)
and D David Savard (oblique). Healthy scratches were RW Jared Boll
and D Justin Falk. ... Calgary's scratches were LW Brandon Bollig, C
Markus Granlund and D Jakub Nakladal. ... Nakladal would have made
his NHL debut had TJ Brodie not been deemed healthy. Brodie left
Wednesday's game against Nashville in the second period after taking
a slap shot to the knee and did not practice Thursday with what the
Flames originally feared was a serious injury. ... Friday's game was
the second of Flames D Dennis Wideman's 20-game suspension for
checking a linesman on Jan. 27. ... Friday's game was the Blue
Jackets' 14th of 18 back-to-back games this season. ... LW Scott
Hartnell, the Blue Jackets' leading scorer, is four goals from 300
for his career.
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