Florida Panthers Outclass League-Leading Jets in Bounceback Effort

The Florida Panthers bounced back from a two-game skid to blitz the NHL’s best Winnipeg Jets 5-0.

SUNRISE, Fla. — If dropping two straight games to the New Jersey Devils was the Stanley Cup hangover for the Florida Panthers, then playing host to the league-leading Winnipeg Jets served as the Pedialyte.

Florida outright bullied Winnipeg, beating 5-0 and handing them their third loss of the season. And they manhandled them in just about every aspect of the game.

“I think two games in a row was enough for us, and I think we were ready to go from puck drop on this one,” Evan Rodrigues said. “Playing a good team will help you do that. Hopefully we can keep riding it for a little bit.”

The Panthers flew out of the gate, outshooting the Jets 10-5 in the first period, but it was a three-goal second period that gave them the separation they needed in the end.

Florida’s stars shined, with Aleksander Barkov scoring a goal and two assists, Sam Reinhart picking up three apples, and Sergei Bobrovsky outplaying the early Vezina Trophy favorite, stopping all 27 shots he faced. Connor Hellebuyck gave up more than four goals for just the second time this season, allowing five of them on 31 shots in just his second loss of the year.

It was a stark difference from those two games against the Devils.

“I think we just had to work harder,” Barkov said. “Our systems, we know really well. We know what we need to do, and if we don’t play hard, if we don’t give everything we have, it’s hard to do that. And today was a good example of everyone working as hard as possible.”

This was a Panthers team that let things fly off the rails after mistakes piled up against the Devils — that did not happened on Saturday night.

When Hellebuyck made a superhuman-esque save on Reinhart 4:56 into the game, Florida kept on pushing until they got one over on him later in the period.

That was what set them apart from the team New Jersey ran out of its own building twice in the same week.

“Well, we needed it,” coach Paul Maurice said. “You lose two at home, that hurts. It’s worse when it’s the same team that beat you twice. So we needed a foundation game to get back to the basics of what we’re good at and we were good in almost all parts of it.

“I thought our bench was right. You’re looking for almost the heads more than the bodies. You understand over the course of the year that the bodies aren’t going to be great a lot of nights, but I thought we came out of our fog a little bit here and we were good tonight.”

The Panthers found the key to beating Hellebuyck with 5:01 to go in the first period, when Gustav Forsling threw a puck into the slot that deflected off of Mackie Samoskevich and in to take the 1-0 lead into the intermission.

Florida kept firing shots on net and going after second-chance opportunities, and that was what led to its next four goals.

The Panthers found a rare key to beating Hellebuyck, and they went to that well a lot.

“He’s the type of goalie that the first or second shot doesn’t go in the net easily,“ Barkov said. “So you need those second, third, fourth chances. Rebounds, tips, all those kinds of things. So we needed to work really hard in front of him to get those pucks on the net, and that’s what we did and we had some success tonight.”

Nate Schmidt picked up the first of those four goals just over two minutes into the second period, picking up a Sam Bennett rebound and firing it home after he bursted past three Winnipeg defenders with speed and fired a nifty backhand shot on net.

He took a second to admire what his teammate did before jumping on that puck and firing it home to make it 2-0.

“I almost had the controller disconnected for a second because I was watching Benny as a fan,” Schmidt said. “I stopped skating for a second, I was like ‘Wow, what a nice play! Oh, I should be down there.’”

Rodrigues then snapped home the rebound of a Barkov shot, just after he picked up an Aaron Ekblad rebound, with 7:39 to go in the second period to make it a 3-0 game.

Barkov scored a goal of his own with 5:24 to go in the second period, picking up the bounce of a Reinhart shot that just hit the crossbar the wrong way and sliding it home on his backhand on a shorthanded rush.

Dmirty Kulikov potted home a Barkov rebound 3:23 into the third period to make it a 5-0 game.

From the number of times the word “rebound” was used in this story, the tale of the tape was clear, the Panthers out-worked the Jets, got the puck in the dirty areas and took full advantage of it.

“I thought we got back to our game and got really physical,” Rodrigues said. “It was more of a playoff style hockey game than we have been used to this year. It was a really good 60 minutes.”

Bobrovsky picked up 10 saves in the third period to pick up his first shutout of the year.

“The people that are leaders in the room were really good tonight,” Maurice said. “The biggest minute-men on normal nights, and Sergei is our biggest minute-guy every night he’s in the net. He was very good and solid…the guys that needed to lead, did.”

The Panthers will get a crack at the Jets again on Tuesday night, this time in Winnipeg, and it will be interesting for a few reasons.

For one, the loss marked the first time the Jets lost two games in a row all year, and they dropped both games they played in the state of Florida in convincing fashion to both the Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning this week.

Panthers fans also poked the bear in the latter half of the game, chanting “Bobby’s Better“ at Hellebuyck while sprinkling in some “overrated” chants.

The Panthers are expecting the same response from Winnipeg as they had from those two losses from New Jersey.

“That’s the expectation,” Maurice said. “That’s why I do prefer a home-and-home. When you go back into their building, it’ll make for a great game. … They’ll be at their best for sure.”