New Jersey Devils center Jack Hughes (86) fights with Carolina Hurricanes center Sebastian Aho during the second period of Game 3 of an NHL hockey Stanley Cup second-round playoff series, Sunday in Newark, N.J. (AP photo)

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — With their season on the line once again, Jack Hughes stepped up for the New Jersey Devils and the budding superstar delivered with his stick, his skates and even a few totally unexpected punches.

Hughes scored two goals, set up two more and had a near fight with Carolina star Sebastian Aho as the Devils began the task of digging out of another hole with a 8-4 win over the Hurricanes in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference semifinals Sunday.

Hughes set the tone early with an assist on Timo Meier’s goal with a pass from behind the net and ripping a second shot past Frederik Andersen five minutes later.

“I think we were just focused right from the get go,” said Hughes, who is nominated for this year’s Lady Byng award for sportsmanship. “Up and down the lineup, a lot of compete — a lot of guys winning their battles, a lot of skating. That’s our game.”

What wasn’t Hughes’ game was his second-period dust-up with Aho in front of the Carolina net. Hughes picked up the Finnish player and attempted to body slam him to the ice. A couple of punches were attempted with no damage inflicted.

Besides Meier, Nico Hischier and Damon Severson added their first goals of playoffs and Vitek Vanecek returned to the net and made 26 saves and even had an assist on Miles Wood’s third-period breakaway.

“It feels good. It’s a series now so that’s what we wanted to do, have a bounce-back game and scoring eight goals is a statement,” Hischier said. “We still have a couple things to clean up but, hey, we’ll take a win now and it’s 2-1.”

The eight goals were the most for the Devils in a playoff game since they beat Washington 10-4 on April 22, 1988.

Michael McLeod capped a three-goal opening period with a short-handed goal and 19-year-old defenseman Luke Hughes — Jack’s brother — made his playoff debut and picked up two assists. Dawson Mercer had three assists.

Carolina set an NHL record, scoring three short-handed goal in the game. Jordan Martinook scored on a penalty shot in the second period with the Canes down a man and Jordan Staal and Seth Jarvis scored 50 seconds apart on the same penalty kill in the third.

This was a totally different game than the first two in Raleigh, North Carolina, which the Canes won by a combined 11-2 score. They dominated from start to finish in both games.

“We were not good,” Carolina coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “I have never seen us play like that.”

PANTHERS 3, LEAFS 2

Sam Reinhart scored 3:02 into overtime and the Florida Panthers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs to take a commanding 3-0 lead in their Eastern Conference semifinal series.

Reinhart dumped the puck off the boards behind the net to set up his game-winner, taking a pass back from Anton Lundell and scoring to give Florida its first 3-0 series lead in 27 years.

Anthony Duclair and Carter Verhaeghe scored for Florida. Sam Lafferty and Erik Gustafsson scored for Toronto.

Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 22 shots for the Panthers. Joseph Woll stopped 18 of the 21 he faced for the Maple Leafs after he relieved starter Ilya Samsonov, who stopped all eight shots he saw before leaving early in the second period with an injury.

Game 4 is Wednesday night.

KRACKEN 7, STARS 2

Jordan Eberle sparked a five-goal outburst in the second period outburst with his fourth goal of the playoffs, Philipp Grubauer made 24 saves and the Seattle Kraken beat the Dallas Stars in Seattle to take a 2-1 series lead in their Western Conference semifinal.

Eberle was the recipient of an unfortunate bounce, beating Dallas goalie Jake Oettinger at 2:10 of the second period after the puck hit Stars defenseman Miro Heiskanen in the face and fell to Eberle’s stick.

That was just the start for Seattle. Alex Wennberg doubled the lead 1:26 after Eberle’s goal; Carson Soucy became Seattle’s 16th different goal scorer this postseason, beating Oettinger five-hole at 6:30; and Matty Beniers made it 4-0 at 8:22.

Seattle’s first four shots of the period beat Oettinger, and the Kraken made it 5-1 when Eeli Tolvanen finished a rebound with 37 seconds left in the period.

Twelve different Seattle players had a point. Game 4 is Tuesday night.