Sam Reinhart scored 3:58 into overtime to give the Florida Panthers a hard-fought 3-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres at Amerant Bank Arena in the penultimate game of the regular season.
After stripping Dylan Cozens, Aleksander Barkov slipped a pass to a streaking Reinhart and he beat Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen for his 55th of the season to end it, giving the Cats home-ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs.
Reinhart’s strike ended what looked to be a high-scoring game that instead settled into a goaltenders’ duel after the first period.
Tyson Jost’s deflection of Rasmus Dahlin’s shot from the blue line opened the scoring at the 2:59 mark. It was Jost’s third of the campaign, and the second assist went to Henri Jokiharju.
The Panthers countered 2:03 later when Anton Lundell collected a centering pass from Matthew Tkachuk off his skate and then roofed an impressive backhander over Luukkonen to continue his recent hot streak. Nick Cousins picked up the secondary helper on the play.
Kevin Stenlund notched his second shorthanded marker of the season at 8:11 to put the Cats on top briefly. Stenlund lugged the puck the other away and solved Luukkonen five-hole after stealing the puck from Dahlin at the Florida blue line. Great piece of work by Stenlund!
The Sabres would pull the goal back before the tripping call on Cousins expired to even the score. After taking a pass from Owen Power, Bowen Byram smacked a rising shot on Sergei Bobrovksy that was stopped, but not held, and Jack Quinn was there to pound in the rebound.
That would be it for goals until the extra session as Luukkonen made 27 saves over the second and third periods while Bobrovsky stopped 20 shots over those forty minutes.
Reinhart’s tenth game-winning goal of the season extended Florida’s winning streak to three games and gave the Cats a 4-0-1 record over their last five outings. The Panthers have only given up four goals and registered three shutouts during that span. The ship has been righted, and with one more game to go against Toronto on Tuesday, the team looks primed for the postseason to begin.
Swords & Tequila
- Some Sam Reinhart stuff. His goal was his 92nd point of the season, tying him with Pavel Bure (2000-01) and Jonathan Huberdeau (2018-19) for the fifth-most in a single season in franchise history. His ten game-winning goals are the second-most in club history (Bure had 14 in 1999-00) and put him in a four-way tie for third-most in the NHL this season, behind Brayden Point (14) and Filip Forsberg (13). His 55 goals are second-most in the league, trailing only the amazing Auston Matthews. Not sure if Reinhart plays on Tuesday to add to those gaudy totals, so will say it here… What an incredible, incredible season!
- Appearing in his 700th NHL game, Sergei Bobrovsky finished with 27 saves and registered his 36th win of the campaign. That’s the second-most in franchise history, behind the 39 he posted in 2021-22, however, this is Bobrovsky finest regular season in a Panthers uniform. He sports a 2.37 GAA, a .915 save percentage and 6 shutouts.
- Anton Lundell is wrapping up his third NHL season on high note. Lundell has produced four goals and two assists over the last six games.
- The Sabres are missing the postseason again, but it looks like they’ve found a number one goalie. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was excellent, making 43 saves, 16 of them in the third period, to earn his team its 82nd point.
- After an uneven month of March, Matthew Tkachuk has points in five of six games in April. We need more of that Tkachuky cheese in the playoffs.
- Prospect Jack Devine registered three shots on goal as Denver knocked off Boston College 2-0 to win the NCAA championship. That’s two titles for Devine, who could be inked to an entry-level contract soon.
- That’s three games in a row that the Panthers completed a season-series sweep. Read more about it at Die By The Blade.