Florida picked a great night to excel on special teams as there were 167 penalty minutes handed out Monday

A strong road effort by the Florida Panthers was just what the doctor ordered following consecutive losses on home ice.

Florida came out firing on all cylinders on Monday night in Ottawa, bringing a playoff-like effort to the home of the Senators and sending their divisional opponent home with nothing but bruises to show for their efforts.

Riding a strong night on special teams and enduring a truckload of penalties, the Panthers earned a convincing 5-0 victory over Ottawa at Canadian Tire Centre.

Here are your three takeaways from a fun night in Canada’s capital city.

Florida played its way

Coming off two straight tough losses, Florida was looking to get back to playing the way it wanted to play.

That was far from the case on Friday against Winnipeg, which was possibly the Panthers worst collective effort of the season.

Monday in Ottawa, Florida imposed its will and suffocated the normally potent Senators on their home ice.

Afterwards, Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice seemed quite pleased with his team’s effort.

“We had a real tough outing against Winnipeg and didn't look anything like the game that we want to play, but I thought (tonight), even in the third (period) it got a little squirrely, but the first two periods for sure, in terms of tactically how we want to play the game, we were pretty darn good,” Maurice said.

Penalty-fest in Ottawa

A dominant effort by Florida was very possibly overshadowed by the amount of penalties and skirmishes between the Panthers and Senators.

In total, 13 misconducts and 167 penalty minutes were handed out.

By the end of the game, both benches had more open space than players to fill it.

Once it was over, though, nobody seemed to want to make more out of it than what it was.

“It’s just a hockey game,” Maurice said. “You can't play-fight in the game and both teams want to win, and you get a little snarly and that was fun. It's good.”

As for the volume of penalty minutes and players who finished the game in the locker room, Maurice played it off in a very poetic way.

“That's mild. We only got to about 160-something minutes there. It's got to get into the 250s before it gets too squirrely. Sometimes hockey can get like that. That's part of why the game is so darn great, because it's graceful and beautiful and physical and angry all at the same time.”

Special teams big night

It felt like a long time coming, but Florida finally delivered an impressive, well-rounded effort on special teams that ended with tangible results.

After coming into the game on a 1-for-17 power play stretch, Florida scored four times while on the man advantage Monday in Ottawa.

They were also pristine on the penalty kill, exterminating all six of Ottawa’s power plays while allowing the Senators only four shots while up a man.

“We've had said so many chances to score on the power play and it hasn't gone for us,” Maurice said. “It's good that our special teams at the end won us the game. Our goaltender made a couple of saves that he had to make to keep it right, but our penalty kill was as good as our power play tonight and that won us the game.”

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