Panthers Hold Off Canes, Win Second-Straight Game 6-3

The Florida Panthers won consecutive games for the first time in nearly three weeks, defeating the East-leading Carolina Hurricanes 6-3 on Black Friday.

The Florida Panthers might officially be back.

Two days after ending their 1-6-0 slide, the turkey-fueled Panthers went on the road and took down the Carolina Hurricanes, 6-3, on Black Friday.

And just like that, the Panthers pulled one point ahead of the Toronto Maple Leafs for first place in the Atlantic Division.

Even after seeing a two-goal lead vanish in the second period, Florida stuck to its identity, dug in and took the lead back in the third.

“Having a 3-1 lead on the road is nice, and when they got a few, we didn’t waiver in our confidence in our game,” Aaron Ekblad said. “We continued to be hard on the forecheck and did all of those cliche things you hear in an interview tonight.”

The Panthers knew what they were doing was working, even after the Hurricanes tied it up.

Eric Robinson’s goal with 2:42 to go in the second period was just Carolina’s third shot of the frame. Florida kept its same intensity, only the Hurricanes were able to get a couple of shots to squeak through in the third.

So, they came out and continued to play their style of hockey to start the third.

“I think for some teams, it does, but I think over the last couple of years, we have a lot of experience with that, especially going on deep [playoff] runs, we kind of judge ourselves on the process,“ Verhaeghe said, when asked if the blown two-goal lead re-focused the team.

“Sometimes, they go in. It’s always tough, but I think we liked our game for most of the night and we just said that we were going to stick with it.”

A.J. Greer took advantage of a neutral-zone miscue from the Hurricanes, walked right into the slot and wired a wrist shot past Spencer Martin to give Florida the lead 4:58 into the third period.

It was one the Panthers never relinquished, and instead built off on, when Anton Lundell wired home a rebound of an Eetu Luostarinen shot on the penalty kill 4:10 later.

Florida got contributions from just about every piece of its lineup — the penalty kill went 4-for-5 with a goal, all four forward lines contributed at least a goal at 5-on-5 and Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 27 of the 30 shots he faced.

“All of the lines had a pretty solid indenting to their game,” coach Paul Maurice said.

Jesper Boqvist opened the scoring 2:26 into the game, beating Martin with a backhand shot from the top of the circle. Seth Jarvis tied the game up just over three minutes later, but the Panthers did not take long to fight back.

Sam Reinhart ripped his league-leading 18th goal of the year past Martin 9:05 into the third period to re-take the lead. Carter Verhaeghe then tallied a goal of his own 1:16 later to give Florida a two-goal lead.

The Panthers found themselves on the penalty kill for an extended period of time at the end of the first period after Dmitry Kulikov, Verhaeghe and Aaron Ekblad all took penalties within a minute of each other. And they survived that stretch after some big defensive plays from Gustav Forsling and Uvis Balinskis.

Carolina got back into the game in the second period — with Sean Walker snapping a shot from the point past Bobrovsky 6:24 in and Eric Robinson tying the game with 2:42 to go in the frame — but the Panthers, characteristically fought back.

Greer and Lundell set the tone early, they outshot Carolina 13-8 in the third and they were able to put the game away via an empty-net goal from Sam Bennett with seven seconds to go.

These two squads will take each other on again back in Sunrise for the back half of the home-and-home set on Saturday.

Pucks and Palms is celebrating Black Friday early! Save 25% on an annual subscription from now until Dec. 1 with the button below: