RALEIGH, N.C. — When he eventually tells the story of his first career goal, Pittsburgh rookie Jayson Megna won’t embellish any of the details. Sidney Crosby did set it up, and it did ice a victory that ended a losing streak.

That it clicked in off his shin pad? No big deal.

Megna scored his first goal on a deflection after he also earned his first assist, helping the Penguins snap a three-game slide by beating the Carolina Hurricanes 3-1 on Monday night.

“I told him, `That’s not the way you usually dream of scoring your first one,”’ Crosby said. “But you take them any way you can get them.”

Chris Kunitz and Tanner Glass also scored for the Metropolitan Division-leading Penguins. Brooks Orpik had three assists, Crosby added two and Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 20 shots.

Pittsburgh ended its longest losing streak since 2011-12 by defeating the Hurricanes for the fourth straight time.

“We had some lapses for periods (during the slide) and that hurt us and ended up costing us the game,” Crosby said. “When you do good things, you don’t want to spoil it with some errors that were mental errors, and we bounced back here tonight and got a big win.”

Nathan Gerbe scored a power-play goal for Carolina, which lost its third straight. The Hurricanes remained tied with the New York Islanders for second in the division — five points behind the Penguins.