Florida will now face the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference Final
The Florida Panthers are turning into quite the Cinderella story.
After squeaking into the playoffs as the second Wild Card team during the final week of the regular season, the Panthers have become playoff giant killers.
It was shocking enough to the hockey world when Florida took down the record-breaking Boston Bruins in seven games during the first round.
Now the Panthers are moving on to the Eastern Conference Final after defeating the Toronto Maple Leafs in five games.
Home ice advantage? Who needs it.
Florida won all three games played in Toronto during the series and has now won six consecutive postseason road contests.
The Panthers reward for their back-to-back upsets?
They get to face the Metropolitan Division Champion Carolina Hurricanes.
Before shifting focus to the challenge ahead, let’s not forget the accomplishments of today.
Florida has become the playoff team that nobody wants to play.
Nobody ever denied the Panthers’ talent and ability to put the puck in the net, but there is quite a bit more depth to what they do on a nightly basis now.
They’ve become an extremely physical team that forces opponents out of their comfort zone and wears players down by punishing them over and over with a relentless forechecking game.
But there is also an X-factor that has put the Panthers over the top in terms of a lack of weaknesses.
That difference maker is Sergei Bobrovsky.
Bob was brilliant during the Toronto series, giving up two goals in each of the five games while stopping 164 of 174 shots for a .942 save percentage.
The way Florida Head Coach Paul Maurice has his Panthers playing, it appears the team will go as far as Bobrovsky will take them.
As long as Bob is playing at this level, it’s going to be very difficult to defeat Florida.
FIRST PERIOD
On the first shift of the game Auston Matthews found Mitch Marner alone in the high slot, but the long wrist shot was stopped by the blocker of Bobrovsky.
Eetu Luostarinen took a high stick from Jake McCabe less than a minute later, giving Florida an early power play.
Right off the next draw, Joseph Woll made a save on Sam Bennett and then stopped Sasha Barkov’s rebound chance, indicating the rookie goalie was locked in from the start.
Toward the end of the penalty, Florida’s second power play unit was able to cash in.
Defenseman Aaron Ekblad blasted a one-timer that went off Woll’s glove but trickled over the goal line to give the Panthers an early 1-0 lead.
Less than five minutes into the game, shots on goal were 9-1 in favor of Florida.
Toronto would get their first power play about three minutes later when Ekblad was called for tripping Sam Lafferty.
Bobrovsky came up with big stops on Matthews, twice, and then John Tavares on a down-low deflection to keep the Leafs off the scoreboard.
Sam Bennett laid a big hit on Tavares in front of the penalty boxes, knocking the Leafs’ star to the seat of his pants.
The hit led to a nice opportunity for Matthew Tkachuk down low on Woll, but the goaltender absorbed the puck and made sure there was no rebound to be had.
Bobrovsky made back-to-back save on William Nylander, but in the same sequence Radko Gudas was called for interference on T.J. Brodie in front of the crease.
Florida’s penalty kill again came up big, led by Bobrovsky and a great individual efforts by Ekblad and Eric Staal.
Remember when the Cats were leading 9-1 in shots? When the penalty was over, Toronto held the edge 12-11.
A nice save by Bobrovsky on McCabe led right to a Panthers goal.
Anthony Duclair held the puck just long enough for Verhaeghe to come open down the right side of Toronto’s zone before sliding a pass right into Verhaeghe’s wheelhouse.
The one-timer beat Woll on the short side, giving Florida a 2-0 lead that they would take into the first intermission.
Toronto ended up outshooting the Cats 13-12 but Florida had the edge where it counted.
SECOND PERIOD
Tavares forced a turnover from Gus Forsling deep in Florida’s zone early in the second period, leading to solid scoring opportunity for the Leafs, but they were again stymied by Bobrovsky.
Florida then took a turn generating a look on goal when Tkachuk forced a turnover at the Leafs blue line. It led to Bennett finding Nick Cousins alone down low, but his shot was blocked by Matthews.
It was Toronto’s first shot block of the game, which was interesting considering they blocked 21 in Game 4.
Bobrovsky continued to look sharp, stopping a laser from the point off the stick of Mark Giordano and then diving on the rebound just as Tavares was about to get a stick on it.
Toronto finally got on the board with just over 12 minutes to go in the period.
Morgan Reilly sent a point shot toward the net that went off Cousins' leg on the way in. The deflected puck squeaked through Bobrovsky and into the net.
Momentum was shifting in Toronto’s favor as the sellout crowd at Scotiabank Arena was as loud as it had been all night.
Marc Staal required some medical attention after blocking a centering pass with the side of his head, right in the ear area, on a Leafs’ odd-man rush.
Play was whistled down, much to the chagrin of the paying audience at Scotiabank Arena, but Staal stayed on Florida’s bench and did not miss any game time.
Reilly thought he scored after sliding the puck under Bobrovsky late in the period when he found himself with tons of space on the right side of Florida’s zone.
Though Reilly and the Leafs celebrated as though the puck had gone in, the call on the ice was no goal.
After an extensive review, the call was upheld by the off-ice officials, much to the chagrin of Maple Leafs fans who delayed the re-start of the game due to all the trash they threw on the ice.
The second period would end with Florida leading Toronto 2-1
THIRD PERIOD
Toronto opened the third period with a flurry of shots on Bobrovsky. He stopped Luke Schenn, Nylander, Marner and Matthews in a span of about 15 seconds.
Whenever the Leafs had the puck, Florida was dropping back and trying to keep them from entering the zone with possession or speed.
The Panthers’ exciting moments during the early stages of the period came when Bennett leveled Reilly in the corner of the Leafs’ zone, after which Verhaeghe nearly got a breakaway on Woll, but his shot attempt whistled wide.
Through the first ten minutes of the third period, Toronto outshot the Panthers 8-2.
Time continued to slowly tick away and Bobrovsky remained a brick wall for Florida. When the game hit the final TV timeout of the third period, Bob was already up to 41 saves.
With 4:26 to go Nylander came flying down the right side and sent a shot from below the circle that went over Bobrovsky’s shoulder and into the top of the net, tying the game at two.
The shot was from an extremely sharp angle, an area goals don’t normally get scored from, but Nylander’s speed allowed him to catch Bobrovsky in an awkward motion.
He then wired a perfectly placed shot over an exposed part of the net. It was a great play by Nylander.
Now it would be up to the Panthers to make the memorable moment the last one Leafs fans would enjoy this season.
For the second time in the series, Florida and Toronto were heading to overtime.
OVERTIME
Calle Jarnkrok cut in alone on Bobrovsky during the first minute of overtime but couldn’t get the puck past Florida’s goaltender.
Bob came up huge a couple minutes later on Matthews, when the Leafs’ star got two shots on goal from in tight.
Bobrovsky slid to his right and got his blocker on the first shot, stopping the second with his leg pad.
Florida was given a power play with 12:25 to go after Brodie fired the puck out of play from the Leafs defensive zone.
Woll was solid, making three saves during the penalty including a point-blank look from Reinhart down low.
A great hustle play by Gudas led to the series-clinching goal.
Ryan O’Reilly and Timothy Liljegren collided in front of Florida’s goal, giving the Cats an opportunity to counterattack with numbers.
Gudas recognized the situation, put his head down and hauled ass up the ice to give Florida an odd-man rush as Cousins carried the puck into the Leafs zone.
The lumbering defenseman didn’t stop there.
As Cousins moved toward Toronto’s goal, Gudas went straight to the top of the crease and parked his massive frame in front of Woll.
Cousins kept the puck on his blade and cut to the middle of the ice before firing a shot past Woll as Gudas jumped in the air to screen him.
Game over.
Series over.
On to the conference final.
GAME NOTES
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