Panthers playoff push takes hit in 6-3 loss to Philly
The Florida Panthers were the better team for the majority of Tuesday’s game in Philadelphia, but a bad few minutes late in the second period cost them a valuable two points.
Florida was dominant in the first period and for the first half of the second period.
It was really just a few bad shifts that did the Panthers in, with the Flyers reeling off three goals in just over two minutes to turn the game from a tight battle to a blowout.
“It’s tough, you’re going to go through moments like that,” Sam Reinhart said after the game. “We move on and we get ready for the next one.”
The Panthers were without Sam Bennett and Anthony Duclair, which led to an 11 forward, 7 defenseman situation that hindered head coach Paul Maurice’s ability to roll four lines and keep his forwards fresh.
Bennett was ruled out earlier in the day while Duclair never skated out for warmups and ultimately was held out of the game.
Afterwards we leanred that Duclair had been dealing with an illness and it got worse as the day progressed.
“He wasn’t feeling great this afternoon but if he had stayed were he was at, in terms of sickness level, he would’ve been able to play,” Maurice said. “By the time we got to the rink, there wasn’t a chance he could play.
“That one surprised us a little bit.”
Anton Lundell moved up to the top line with Barkov and Reinhart while Eetu Luostarinen centered the second line with Matthew Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe.
Eric Staal and Nick Cousins joined Ryan Lomberg on the third line.
FIRST PERIOD
The Eetu-centered second line was on the ice for a matter of seconds when they opened the scoring.
It was a great passing play that started with Luostarinin bringing the puck in the zone and making a cross-ice pass to Verhaeghe, who quickly sent the puck to a streaking Tkachuk in the slot.
Chucky deflected home a perfect pass through Carter Hart’s five-hole and the Panthers were off and running.
The Flyers tied game on a point shot with Alex Lyon screened by Radko Gudas and Joel Farabee. Lyon never saw the puck.
SECOND PERIOD
It was all Panthers for the first 10 minutes of the period, with the puck kept almost entirely in Philadelphia’s zone.
One sequence in particular saw Hart make several sparkling saves as Florida pressed and forced turnovers, including a pad stop on Tkachuk in tight and a glove save on Gudas to finally get a whistle.
Shortly after, the Flyers finally got themselves some zone time and were able to capitalize on a fortunate bounce as Gudas’ clearing attempt hit a Philly player and bounced to Brendan Lemieux.
He patiently waited for Travis Sanheim to find some open ice in the opposite circle before layering a perfect pass across the zone. Sanheim waited for Lyon to overcommit and put a perfect shot in the upper left corner.
For the first time in this game, Florida found itself trailing.
Less than a minute later Lyon came up with a huge save after Wade Allison got behind the Panthers defense for a breakaway.
An amazing shift by Sasha Barkov led to the Panthers tying the game.
He was all over the ice, controlling the puck, pulling it off the boards, finding open teammates, and eventually he made a great feed from behind the net to a pinching Brandon Montour.
Montour’s sharp angle shot found the tiniest of holes between Hart and the post, but as we’ve seen, it’s a lot harder to beat Hart when he’s locked in place than when you get him moving side to side.
The game didn’t stay tied very long.
Tony DeAngelo caught Florida’s defense napping and found Scott Laughton streaking across the Panthers blue line.
Lyon went down with his paddle on the ice extremely early and Laughton simply made a few dekes and waited for Lyon to slide himself out of the way, as he was already off his skates.
Philly scored again just over a minute later, with Sanheim finding a loose puck in front of Lyon, who had just lost his goal stick when the puck went behind Florida’s net.
Another defensive breakdown led to Ivan Provorov alone in front, and he beat Lyon to make it 5-2.
Three Flyers goals in 2:01.
THIRD PERIOD
For a game that was tied with 3:05 to go in the second period, there wasn’t much excitement to the final frame.
Reinhart made things a bit interesting after scoring a power play goal with Lyon on the bench and 6:11 to go.
With about 4:30 to go Maurice put out line of Barkov, Tkachuk and Reinhart, then pulled Lyon and sent out Verhaeghe.
Verhaeghe got a great backdoor look off a perfect feed from Montour, but Hart slid across and made a great right pad stop.
Florida put on plenty of pressure but a blocked point shot led to the ‘nail in the coffin’ empty net goal.
QUICK HITS
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