The Florida Panthers snapped out of their recent funk, at least for a night, with an emphatic 6-0 rout of the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre.
Florida seemed highly motivated to get back on track, setting a new mark for the fastest two goals (1:37) to start a game in franchise history.
After corralling Sam Bennett’s dump-in along the opposite side boards, Matthew Tkachuk spotted Nick Cousins skating into open space and set him up for the first strike at the 1:02 mark.
Dmitry Kulikov would net his first goal of the season 35 seconds later to put the Cats up by a pair. Kulikov took a pass from Eetu Luostarinen and rocketed a slap shot past a screened Joonas Korpisalo, with the secondary assist going to Evan Rodrigues.
Anton Lundell, who also scored on Tuesday in Montreal, netted a geometry-bending goal 2:35 into the middle frame off Korpisalo’s nameplate from below the goal line. Luostarinen and Cousins were credited with the helpers, giving the duo two points each on the night.
Bennett would collect his second point of the tilt by beating Korpisalo at 4:19 from the middle of the slot after Tkachuk tracked down Bennett’s clear and then found him with a sweet little drop pass. Josh Mahura drew the second assist on the goal, which sent Korpisalo to bench and Anton Forsberg into the Ottawa crease.
Forsberg would not make it out of the period unscathed, yielding the fifth goal to Sam Reinhart with 2:04 to go. After Vladimir Tarasenko got bumped down while receiving a pass, Reinhart took possession of the puck and then worked a pretty passing sequence with Barkov before firing in his 53rd of the season.
Barkov and Reinhart would draw the assists on Tkachuk’s power-play tip-in which put the exclamation point on the rout 3:54 into the third. The three-point performance was Tkachuk’s first multi-point game since March 23.
Florida’s top-six roared, Sergei Bobrovksy was unbeatable, and the Panthers looked like… well, the Panthers again. The Cats, who broke the 100-point barrier for the third time ever, will play their final road game of the regular season against the Boston Bruins on Saturday afternoon with a national audience watching.
Law & Order
- Sergei Bobrovsky earned the nod for First Star, finishing with 30 saves to post his 34th win and fifth shutout. Bobrovsky was particularly sharp in the first period, stopping 13 shots. It was the second time he blanked the Senators in Ottawa this season.
- Sam Bennett is making a late bid to reach the 20-goal plateau for the second time in his career. Bennett has the lit the lamp in the last three games to get to 19 goals.
- It took him 71 games, but he finally got one! The last time Dmitry Kulikov scored a goal for the Panthers was on March 5, 2015 in a 4-3 shootout loss to the Dallas Stars.
- Joonas Korpisalo stopped 13 of 17 shots before departing. Anton Forsberg made 12 saves in relief.
- Vladimir Tarasenko collected his 30th assist of the season in his first game against the Senators since the trade that sent him south in early March. Tarasenko played 12:10 and registered one shot against his old mates.
- Props to head coach Paul Maurice, who picked up his 865th win to pass Lindy Ruff for sole possession of fourth place in NHL history.