Three takeaways: Pulling positives from dominant loss, second line on the rise
The Florida Panthers played a strong, imposing game on home ice Saturday against the New York Islanders.
Unfortunately for the Cats, it wasn’t enough to overcome a sterling goaltending effort on a night where the bounces just didn’t seem to go their way.
Instead, the Islanders skated to a 4-3 victory at Amerant Bank Arena.
The loss was Florida’s third straight on home ice, but despite the unfavorable result, it was a game that also gave the Panthers some things to feel good about.
Lots of positives
This was one of those games where you can talk yourself to sleep about all the things that went right.
But when you lose a game despite being the better team, that usually means there are some not-so-glaring issues that get more attention than they would under normal circumstances.
“I thought we were real good tonight,” Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice said. “It was a game so where you'll focused on the two or three things (that went wrong). There were some slight puck movement issues, but if you put up that many shot attempts, I would say that we have to do what Carter Verhaeghe he did on his goal and get better net front, but that guy (Sorokin) stood on his head.”
Too many missed attempts?
The Panthers outshot New York 45-27 during Saturday’s game, capped off by a lopsided 18-6 edge during the third period.
Florida’s 45 shots came on an eye-popping 94 shots attempts, which broke down to 23 that missed the net and 26 that were blocked.
While the team did not starve for opportunities against the Islanders – far from it – Florida still left quite a bit on the plate.
“I think if we got more pucks through we would have had…we were into the 90s (in shot attempts) so that leaves us about 25 shot blocks. You need to do better,” Maurice said. “Then we missed the net a whole heck of a lot too, probably trying to pick corners. It would be in a better net front presence, but I just don't know that you can say it's a failing, (because) then if you did it right, you should’ve had 70 shots on goal. I liked most of what we did tonight.”
Second line turning a corner
Saturday’s game marked the eleventh of the season for second line center Sam Bennett.
After a pair of lower body injures delayed his ultimate start to the campaign, Bennett has slowly but surely been getting back into the swing of things.
He’s played almost exclusively with Carter Verhaeghe on his left and Matthew Tkachuk on his right, and Maurice has shown patience with keeping the group together despite a limited amount of offensive production.
Late last season and into the Panthers amazing run to the Stanley Cup Final, the trio was arguably Florida’s best, and most consistent, forward unit.
It’s taken them a few weeks, but the line is starting to show signs of the supremacy it displayed a season ago.
Tkachuk scored for the first time in ten games on Saturday, having gone the previous eight with only an assist, while Verhaeghe has logged a goal and an assist in consecutive games.
“I think the chemistry, we know it's there,” Maurice said of the line. “I think it's starting to come. They were really good in Montreal. I think that line is coming together. They'll start scoring.”
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