The Florida Panthers dropped their third straight game at home, falling to the Toronto Maple Leafs by a 4-1 count at Amerant Bank Arena.
Toronto scored twice in a 2:30 span of the first period to take control of the scoreboard.
Recent waiver claim Troy Stecher opened the scoring at the 5:24 mark. After taking a low to high pass from Bobby McMann, Stecher beat Sergei Bobrovsky with a wrister from the right point through a screen. The second assist on Stecher’s first of the season went to Dakota Joshua.
Stecher and McMann would combine to set up Joshua at 7:54 to put the Buds up two. A whiff by Jeff Petry allowed McMann to fed Joshua in front and he lifted a wrister over Bobrovsky’s right pad.
With Bobrovksy shrugging off the two early goals and putting on a clinic to keep his team close, the Panthers finally solved Joseph Woll 14:43 into the middle frame with Aaron Ekblad off for holding.
After Anton Lundell and Sam Reinhart worked an unsuccessful give-and-go off the rush, the determined pair of penalty killers were able to regain possession of the puck from a trio of Maple Leafs. Lundell chipped a centering pass in front and Reinhart pulled Woll to his left before firing home for his 14th of the campaign.
A series of misfortunate events in the defensive zone put the Maple Leafs back up by two with 7:42 left in the third.
Nick Robertson applied heavy pressure to Gustav Forsling while he was chasing down a dump-in, forcing him to weakly backhand the puck to former Cat Steven Lorentz. Lorentz’ centering pass struck Mackie Samoskevich, then dribbled in front where a backchecking Ekblad had his stick lifted by Scott Laughton and bumped into Bobrovsky. Laughton was able to find the loose puck, which came back to him off Ekblad’s skate, and swipe it home for his first goal and point of the season. Ugh…
With time running out, Auston Matthews took a pass from Max Domi and sprang John Tavares for a breakaway goal on the empty net to complete the scoring at 19:41.
With the win, the Buds jumped the Buffalo Sabres to move up to sixth in the Atlantic Division, while Panthers fell to eighth place and are now dead last in the Eastern Conference. The already ravaged Cats were without Carter Verhaeghe, who missed his first game of the season. The homestand went from bad to worse and if the Panthers can’t find a way to close out strong over the remaining three games, could end up being disastrous. They take on the Nashville Predators on Thursday.
The Five Hole
- Playing in his 800th NHL game, Sam Reinhart provided the only marker for the struggling Panthers. Reinhart leads the league with 12 shorthanded goals since the start of the 2023-24 campaign. It was his second shorty of the season.
- Anton Lundell leads the club with 14 assists, and he became the third Panther to reach the 20-point mark.
- Sergei Bobrovsky matched Joseph Woll with 26 saves, including eight of the high-danger variety. Bobrovsky lost consecutive starts for the first time in 2025-26.
- Jack Studnicka made his debut for Florida. Studnicka logged 10:32 TOI and was credited with three shots and three hits.
- Led by Jesper Boqvist’s four, the Panthers out-hit the Maple Leafs 27-22. The Buds dominated in the dot, winning 39 of the game’s 54 draws.
Stat Card
