For a second straight night, the Florida Panthers went to overtime, this falling 3-2 to the Chicago Blackhawks on Patrick Kane’s eleventh goal of the season.
Brandon Saad opened the scoring 16:49 into the first period by finding space in the slot to finish off an Alex DeBrincat centering feed with a one-timer. Jonathan Toews collected the secondary assist on the goal with some good work below the goal line.
Nick Bjugstad evened the score with a breakaway goal at the 11:12 mark of the second period. Aleksander Barkov sprung Bjugstad with a long, bouncing lead pass. The lanky winger kicked the puck onto his stick and used his long reach to easily steer the disk around Corey Crawford on the backhand. Mark Pysyk was the credited with the second helper on Bjugstad’s eighth.
The Panthers forged ahead 3:53 into the final frame when Vincent Trocheck took possession of a loose puck at the blue line and found Jamie McGinn with a crossing pass. McGinn went skate to stick before beating Crawford stick side.
The lead held up for 10:05 until Toews got open in the circle and fired the puck by James Reimer after taking a nice backhand dish from Saad to knot things up. DeBrincat picked up his second point of the night with the secondary assist.
Artem Anisimov knocked Matheson off the puck at center and sent Kane in on Reimer for the winner 2:24 into overtime. Kane fired it home with a desperate, diving Matheson trying to knock the puck away off his stick.
The Panthers played well enough to win, but had to settle for a single point. While three points in the back-to-back in Detroit and Chicago is nothing to sneeze at, it’s a shame the Cats could only muster one goal in the second period where they absolutely dominated Chicago, out-shooting them by a hefty 17-5 margin. The road trip continues Thursday night in Denver.
Full Highlights (courtesy of NHL.com)
Bows & Arrows
- The Blackhawks victory gave them their first three-game winning streak of the season.
- In addition to his assist, Vincent Trocheck led the Cats with seven shots on goal and five hits, and also blocked three shots.
- After picking up the win in Detroit, James Reimer started again and finished with 25 saves.
- Chicago netminder Corey Crawford turned aside 35 shots and is 7-0-2 in his last nine starts.
- Evgenii Dadonov returned to lineup after missing eight games and logged 16:38 TOI. Dadonov failed to register a shot on goal.
- All five goals came at even strength as the Blackhawks went 0 for 3 on the power play while the Panthers went 0 for 2.
- Second City Hockey has the other side of Chicago’s second win over Florida./