Florida's heartbreaking loss in St. Louis stemmed from costly errors and a last-second penalty, despite the Cats putting in maximum effort once again.
A frustrating season for the Florida Panthers may have hit its peak on Thursday night.
Playing their tenth road game of the month, Florida rebounded from some rough moments in the first 20 minutes and appeared to give themselves a good chance at two points against the St. Louis Blues.
Alas, a questionable late penalty led to a last-second power play goal by the home team and sent the Panthers home to South Florida empty handed.
“That’s a tough one to swallow,” forward Sam Reinhart said afterwards.
Indeed, Sam.
Let’s get to the takeaways:
EXASPERATING WAY TO LOSE
It’s hard to put it better than Reinhart did.
Did Florida deserve to win? Eh, based off their first period (and we’ll get to that in a second), perhaps not.
But based off the effort they put forth in turning the game around, not getting down on themselves and playing the right way while clawing their way back, they absolutely deserved better than losing in the final seconds on a power play goal that came off a marginal call, though a tough one to make, to be fair.
“It’s heartbreaking because you fight back and get into it the way we did, and get so close to killing it off, with some great blocks and great battles,” said Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice. “That's a tough one.”
UNCHARACTERISTIC ERRORS QUITE COSTLY
Despite taking an early lead in St. Louis, Florida quickly fell behind thanks to a couple of plays that had Maurice and his staff quite unhappy on the bench.
First it was Jake Neighbours getting behind Florida’s defense for a quick breakaway goal, and then a seemingly harmless zone entry by the Blues turned deadly when the Cats failed to pick up Jordan Kyrou in the middle of the ice.
Being the veteran, mature team that they are, Florida didn’t allow the game to spiral out of control, instead digging in and starting to put in the work on mounting a comeback.
But at the end of the day, the Panthers need to tighten the screws because these are mistake they generally do not make.
“We were a little simpler and we were a little more conscientious with what we did with the puck, and we didn’t get so far apart from each other,” Maurice said. “We had some egregious errors in the first (period) that ended up in our net.”
EVERYONE PULLING THE ROPE
There is a long list of valid reasons as to why the Panthers are where they are currently.
More than halfway through the season, Florida is fighting to maintain a spot in a crowded playoff race after an injury-plagued first half has cost them any kind of ability to manage players or playing time as the postseason nears.
It’s going to be balls to the walls from here on out, and there isn’t a person in that room who isn’t ready or up for the challenge.
“We may not have played the smartest first period we ever played, but nobody is not giving (it their all),” Maurice said. “We're paying the price for a tough schedule and a lot of guys out of lineup, and we've run some guys so hard that they’re doing it on will now.”
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Photo caption: Jan 29, 2026; St. Louis, Missouri, USA; St. Louis Blues right wing Jimmy Snuggerud (21) celebrates with right wing Jordan Kyrou (25) after scoring the game winning goal against the Florida Panthers during the third period at Enterprise Center. (Jeff Curry-Imagn Images)