Sam Bennett scored twice in the first period to power the banner-raising Florida Panthers to a 6-4 win over the Boston Bruins in the season-opener for both teams.
While a bit sloppy, Florida’s revamped lineup cruised for the most part, jumping out to a 5-1 lead midway through the game. A couple of late Boston goals made the score respectable, but it wasn’t really that close.
Bennett notched Florida’s first of the campaign 6:27 into the first, swatting the puck home after Evan Rodrigues long shot struck Joonas Korpisalo and came down in the crease.
Eetu Luostarinen potted another one from in-close to double the lead 1:04 later. After Luostarinen cycled the puck up the boards, Sam Reinhart put a sharp-angle shot towards the net that struck Anton Lundell before Luostarinen got it to go.
The shorthanded Bruins got on the board at 15:33 when Elias Lindholm picked up a loose puck and fed Pavel Zacha, who zipped a shot by Sergei Bobrovsky from the left circle. A bit of bad luck here, as Andrew Peeke’s dump-in bounced off Aleksander Barkov, allowing Lindholm to collect, but after what happened in the second half of series against Edmonton, this is an area that needs improvement.
Reinhart made up for the shorty with one his own 3:01 later. After taking an outlet pass from Barkov, Reinhart went up the left boards before cutting in on Korpisalo and beating him with a beautiful shot after first slipping the puck past defenseman Charlie McAvoy.
Bennett notched the Panthers fourth of the frame with 26 seconds left, this time converting the rebound of A.J. Greer’s shot after it hit him in the back. It was Greer’s first point as a Panther.
Speaking of first points as a Panther, Jesper Boqvist would get his 9:12 into second by sending a pretty back door feed to Jonah Gadjovich to make it 5-1 Gatos shortly after Rodrigues saved a goal at the other end. A nice headman pass from Uvis Balinskis started the scoring play off. Two-way hockey, folks…
McAvoy would pull that goal back by solving Bobrovsky five-hole at 12:32 with the helpers going to Johnny Beecher and Hampus Lindholm.
Rodrigues would get the final goal of the night for the champs 6:26 into third by ripping a rising shot from the high slot by Korpisalo’s unworthy blocker. The assists went to Aaron Ekblad and Matthew Tkachuk, whose quick passes got the puck out their own zone and sent Rodrigues off the other way. A scrum ensued after Brandon Carlo bumped Bennett into Korpisalo.
A one-timer from Trent Frederic at 16:51 and a power-play goal from David Pastrnak – a pass that deflected in off Dmitry Kulikov’s skate – 1:24 after that allowed the Bruins to close the gap, but it wouldn’t matter as the Panthers went on to open its defense of the Stanley Cup with a big win over a division rival.
Despite seeing a fair bit of turnover to the roster, the Cats didn’t miss a beat and got the season off to a roaring start as eleven different skaters collected at least point and Florida led Boston 30-18 in scoring chances at 5-on-5.
81 games until the playoffs!
Tea & Honey
- While newcomers A.J. Greer and Jesper Boqvist had assists in their respective debuts, defenseman Adam Boqvist logged just 4:38 of ice time (two shots on goal) before departing after getting hit in the mug with the puck.
- Aleskander Barkov’s helper on Sam Reinhart’s shorthanded goal gave the captain as assist in ten consecutive home-openers.
- Anton Lundell registered a game-high five shots on goal and was credited with two hits and a block.
- After seeing Joonas Korpisalo gave up six goals on 29 shots, Bruins fans are thanking their lucky stars that Jeremy Swayman re-signed with the team.
- Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 24 of 28 shots to collect the 397th win of his NHL career.
- For the sadder side of the season-opener, stop by Stanley Cup of Chowder. It’ll taste good.
Verhaeghe
Carter Verhaeghe has signed an eight-year contract extension worth $56 million. Verhaeghe’s new deal will kick in at the start of the 2025-26 and contains a no-movement clause for the first five seasons. Well-earned. Congrats, Carter!