Florida has power play goals in consecutive games after starting the series 0-for-9 with the man advantage
The vibes around the Florida Panthers on Thursday morning were as immaculate as one would expect considering the team had won a playoff overtime game just a few hours before.
Florida staved off elimination against the Presidents’ Trophy winners in their home barn, defeating the Boston Bruins 4-3 to force a Game 6 in Sunrise.
Before flying back to South Florida Thursday, the Panthers enjoyed a team meal while basking in the knowledge that they had taken the best the league’s top team had to offer and somehow, someway, escaped with a win.
Needless to say, everyone was still pretty excited about it.
“You can always tell by how early the guys get down for breakfast in the morning,” Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice said Thursday. “We got a full crew down early.”
Looking back at Game 5, especially from a Boston perspective, it’s easy to dismiss the outcome as a one-off.
The game was very one-sided, from both an analytic viewpoint and from the eye-test, but without ignoring everything the Bruins did well, there are also some positives to take away from Florida’s game.
One big thing is the Panthers power play finally showing signs of life, a stark contrast to the first few games of the series.
Florida has scored with the man advantage in back-to-back games, and the puck movement on their most recent power play, the one where Sam Reinhart scored to give the Cats a 3-2 third period lead Wednesday night, was as good as it has looked in weeks.
One big difference in the unit is that Maurice has gone back to using four forwards, but he’s also moved them to different locations on the ice.
Matthew Thachuk, who normally patrols the area around the goal crease, has been on the right flank. Sam Bennett was called upon to provide a special brand of physical net-front presence and the magical hands of Sasha Barkov are back facilitating things the point, with Brandon Montour and his heavy right-handed clapper hanging around the top side of the left circle.
Between the personnel and their placement, Florida was able to keep the puck in motion and mitigate the aggressive penalty kill of the Bruins, opening up passing lanes and, ultimately, space for Reinhart in an extremely high-danger area between the circles.
The Panthers did such a good job of it on their last power play that Reinhart actually got two great looks from the same spot. The first one went off the heel of his blade and missed the net, but the second one was a perfect shot placed in the top corner that whizzed by Linus Ullmark’s glove.
“The change allowed us to move the puck faster,” Maurice said. “They got to the right speed on it, would be the best way (to describe it). That's a pretty wide-open shot that we can get in the slot. You have to do a lot of good things very quickly to make that happen, and they executed at a real high level.”
Another big positive for Florida to leave Boston with is the play of goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky.
It wasn’t just the volume of saves, the quality of many of those saves or the lack of allowing any low-danger goals, it was the combination. The full package.
“Outstanding, the entire game he was our best player,” said Bennett. “You need your goalie to be your best player if you're going to have success in the playoffs, and it was impressive to see him put on a performance like that in a must-win game.”
There will always be areas of Bobrovsky’s game that are going to be struggles, such as his rebound control or decision making when handling the puck, but when he can come up with timely, elite saves, while not surrendering any goals from sharp angles or from far out, the narrative around his ability to lead a team to victory can change significantly.
Bobrovsky has done it before. He’s won Vezina Trophies. He was outstanding in a first-round sweep of a Presidents’ Trophy winning team the year before Florida signed him.
In professional sports, getting stamped a winner is something that doesn’t wash off easily and is quick to be remembered in situations like this.
“That game that Sergei played, because of the pressure that it was an elimination game, he gets to carry that with him now," said Maurice. "And the team will respect that win for Sergei going forward for years."
The breakaway save on Brad Marchand as time in the third period was expiring is the one that everyone will remember, and rightly so. It was quite literally a season-saving save.
Looking over the course of the game, there were several times Bobrovsky was called upon to make a big stop, and he responded time and time again.
Boston had eight even strength high-danger shots on goal. Bob stopped them all.
The Bruins’ expected goals at five-on-five were 3.1. They scored once at even strength on 38 shots.
It’s that kind of money goaltending that wins playoff games. The kind that people remember.
If Big Game Bob is who shows up for the Panthers on Friday night, don’t be surprised to see both these teams back in Boston for a Game 7.
“He was unbelievable,” said Panthers winger Carter Verhaeghe. “He’s our backbone back there.”