Gustav Forsling scored with 17 seconds left in overtime to lift the undermanned Florida Panthers, who overcame three one-goal deficits, to a 4-3 over the Vegas Golden Knights at Amerant Bank Arena.
After Sam Reinhart deftly knocked Shea Theodore’s shot out of the air, Gustav Forsling collected the puck behind his own goal line and started the rush, blazing up the ice. Forsling handed the puck off to Reinhart at the Vegas blue line and went to the net. Reinhart crossed to Sam Bennett, who went back door to Forsling to capture the bonus point.
The Panthers got off to a strong start in the opening period, but needed a stunning series of saves from Segei Bobrovsky to keep the game scoreless. Bob stopped a high backhander from Cole Schwidt and then back-to-back rebound chances by Alexander Holtz to wow the crowd.
Unfortunately, about two minutes later, Anton Lundell turned the puck over to Nicolas Roy in his own end and Roy fed Tanner Pearson, who calmly wristed a shot over Bobrovsky’s shoulder with 33 seconds left in the frame to put Vegas on top.
The teams returned to the ice for the second period and the Panthers needed just 69 seconds to tie things up. After stopping a dump-in, Bobrovsky shoveled the puck to Forsling, who crossed to Aaron Ekblad. Ekblad snapped a hard diagonal head-man pass to Lundell, who carried it over the line and then tried to hit a driving Luostarinen in the slot. The pass missed, however, it ricocheted off the boards to Reinhart and he hammered the puck through Samsonov.
Vegas regained the lead at the 14:15 mark when Pearson took a lead pass from Roy and, fending off Adam Boqvist, curled in the right corner before whipping a pass in front which caught a piece of Keegan Kolesar skate and deflected past an unprepared Bobrovsky.
A.J. Greer would draw a slashing penalty on Roy allowing the Cats to even things up at 19:20. Bobrovsky sent a long pass ahead to Carter Verhaeghe at the opposing blue line. After receiving a slick drop pass, Lundell sent an equally slick backhand return to Verhaeghe and he crossed to an onrushing Sam Bennett, who completed the beautiful sequence by slamming the puck into the beckoning twine.
The Golden Knights would go up yet again when Brett Howden swiped the puck from Greer near the Florida blue line and finished with a forehand-to-backhand move 7:30 into the third.
Eetu Luostarinen’s goal with 7:17 left in regulation got the game to overtime. Reinhart won an offensive draw that Luostarinen sent back to Ekblad, who put a wrister on net that Ilya Samosonov couldn’t corral. Reinhart tapped the loose puck over to Luostarinen and he deposited it into the wide-open net.
The Panthers out-shot the visitors 6-1 in the extra session and finally got the win with another pretty passing that culminated in Forsling’s second of the season. Down forwards Aleksander Barkov, Matthew Tkachuk and Jonah Gadjovich, Florida’s 19-man roster responded to the challenge by pelting Samonsov with 49 shots to up its record to 4-2-1. Yeah, they helped Vegas out on all of their goals, the first and third in particular, but they showed a lot of moxie by sticking to the grind and getting two points against a difficult opponent.
Swords & Tequila
- After notching his fifth goal and adding two assists, Sam Reinhart is tied with Artemi Panarin for the league league in scoring with 12 points. Reinhart has at least a point in five straight games and is scoring on 26.3% of his shots.
- Monster game for defenseman Aaron Ekblad, who assisted on a pair of goals and finished the tilt with a game-high seven blocks, two shots on goal and two hits.
- Carter Verhaeghe had a game-high 11 scoring chances, but failed to notch his first goal of the season. It’s coming. Verhaghe led both teams with six shots on goal and his set-up of Sam Bennett PPG was quite nice.
- Ilya Samsonov made 45 saves for Vegas and was tagged with his first loss of the season. Sergei Bobrovsky delivered another strong start, stopping 23 of 26 shots to post win number 399.
- Tanner Pearson’s goal was his first as a member of the Golden Knights. Pearson was credited with two shots and two hits in 15:16 of ice time.
- Shrugging off his ghastly giveaway, Anton Lundell is up to eight points after collecting two assists. Lundell, who won 62.5% of his faceoffs, saw his three-game goalscoring streak come to end.