The Florida Panthers shook off an early deficit and cruised to a 5-2 win over the Philadelphia Flyers Tuesday night at BB&T Center.
After gaining the two points and Montreal’s regulation loss to Columbus, Florida moved into second place in the Atlantic Division, four points behind the Boston Bruins.
Travis Sanheim gave the Flyers a 1-0 when he pounded in the rebound after Josh Brown blocked a Philippe Myers shot from the opposite at 6:26 of the first. Sanheim’s knuckling drive caught Sergei Bobrovsky’s arm on it’s way to the back of the net.
The Panthers quickly responded with two goals to take a lead they would not relinquish the rest of the night.
Colton Sceviour tied the game at 10:38 when his long snap-shot from just inside the blue line deflected off the raised stick of Andy Andreoff and eluded Carter Hart. The goal was Sceviour’s second of the season and was assisted by Mike Matheson and Brett Connolly. Matheson did a nice job of maintaining possession of the puck down low and feeding out to Sceviour.
Connolly would beat Hart with a rising sharp-angled shot from along the goal line that struck the goalie in the side of the head to put the Cats up for good 1:52 later. The lone assist on Connolly’s eighth was awarded to Vincent Trocheck.
Florida’s top line would extend the lead to three with a pair of second period goals.
The first came at the 6:46 mark when Aleksander Barkov punched in his seventh goal after Hart gave up a juicy rebound on Evgenii Dadonov’s initial shot. The second assist on the play went to Brown.
Trio numero uno clicked again with Barkov and Dadonov combining to set up Jonathan Huberdeau from the right circle 3:37 later to send Hart to bench for Brian Elliott. A tidy bit of statistics went along with this one with Hubderdeau collecting his tenth goal, Barkov his twentieth assist and Dadonov his tenth helper and twentieth point.
Philadelphia rookie Morgan Frost, making his NHL debut, scored a beautiful backhander, roofing a shot from in-tight on Bobrovsky, to pull one back for the Flyers with 5:20 left in the frame.
That would be it for visitors as Bobrovsky would come up big in the third by stopping all 14 shots he faced to finish the game with 35 saves.
Mike Hoffman scored the clincher with a nice strip and empty-net finish from center ice with 2:32 remaining in regulation.
After keeping the New York Rangers off the scoreboard in third period of Saturday night’s win it was very encouraging to see Bobrovsky and his mates do the same to the Flyers. In addition to taking care of business and getting help from the Blue Jackets, the Panthers also benefited from regulation losses by the Toronto Maple Leafs, Buffalo Sabres and Tampa Bay Lightning and an overtime loss by the Pittsburgh Penguins. Things really couldn’t have gone much better last night. Let’s bask in the glory of second place today before the Panthers take on the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday.
Video Recap
Lift & Drag
- Sergei Bobrovsky, who started his career in Philadelphia, raised his record against his former team to 15-3-1.
- Keith Yandle had his five-game point streak snapped. Yandle collected a goal and nine assists during the torrid stretch.
- Speaking of streaks, the Flyers also ended the Panthers nine-game run of scoring at least one power-play goal.
- In addition to bagging his first NHL goal in style, Morgan Frost registered three shots on goal and a hit in 14:16 TOI. Frost was the 27th overall pick in the 2017 Entry Draft.
- Evgenii Dadonov led all skaters with seven shots on goal and finished with a +2 rating.
- Carter Hart stopped 14 of 18 shots and Brian Elliott made seven saves in relief.
- For more on the latest Cats win, take a stroll over to Broad Street Hockey./