Superstitious Florida is rolling with what works, rolling up to games wearing their custom robes. We’ll see if this new trend lasts until the end of the season, but it is pretty funny in the meantime. The Panthers faced off with the Philadelphia Flyers Saturday night in a closely contested match. The Cats struggled against Philly last season dropping two matches to them down the stretch heading towards the playoffs. HC Paul Maurice opted to put Gadjovich back into the lineup over Samoskevich. He said that it was nothing Samoskevich had done and that he was ahead of schedule in terms of development, but they wanted Gadjovich in for what was going to be a heavy match. The star of the show, especially once things went beyond regulation, was Sergei Bobrovsky. He made some unreal saves in overtime to send things to the shootout, where the Panthers came out on top. With the forwards struggling to put pucks away, the defense stepped up and scored two of the three goals. Barkov and Rodrigues were the heroes of the shootout to get the Cats their seventh straight win.
Brick Wall Bob:
Sometimes, a team is only as good as its goaltender, especially when teams find themselves in what turns out to be a goalie fight. Bobrovsky has been solid so far this season and looks as sharp as last year. Although his SV% on the year is under .900 right now, that’s not indicative of how he’s played as of late. The Flyers’ goals all came on shots Bob couldn’t do anything about, be it traffic in front where the puck took a deflection or a puck that bounced weirdly. Florida opted to run no defensemen during the five-minute OT and while the defense was ok, it was Bobrovsky who stood tall and denied chance after chance that Philly had to put the game away. A little help from the goalposts never hurts either, but Bob was all over whatever the Flyers shot at him. He finished the night, stopping 34 of 37 shots with a .919 SV%, and earned the third star of the night. In the shootout, he stopped Konecny, Brink, Couturier, and Frost; only Tippett got one past him on a wrister shot. The win put Bobrovsky at 404 wins, and he moves into solo 12th place on the NHL all-time goalie wins list, surpassing Grant Fuhr.
Offensive Defensemen:
When the Panther forwards are struggling, the team doesn’t lack offense. The defensemen stepped up big time to get the goal-scoring going. After a goalless first period and a one-goal deficit, Nate Schmidt got the Cats on the board off a hard and heavy slapshot. Crisp passing from Barkov and Rodrigues got the puck to Schmidt who joined the play fresh off the bench. His shot from near the blue line threaded its way through traffic and into the back of the net to tie the game. About three minutes later, Kulikov scored and put Florida up by one, with Rodrigues and Reinhart getting the assists. Kulikov jumped up in the play and found his way to the slot, where his shot went bar down and in for the 2-1 lead. Philly took a timeout and then challenged that the puck had hit the netting prior to the goal being scored, however, video review was inconclusive and the goal stood. Philly tied the game with about seven minutes left in the period. Two big plays from Mikkola contributed to the third Panther goal from Sam Bennett. Mikkola blocked a pass at center and then made a quick backhand pass to Verhaeghe, who got the puck to an open Bennett. That marks eight assists for Mikkola in 15 games as well as a new career-high four-game assist streak; last season, he had three goals and 14 assists in 82 games. Mikkola’s trending for a career year at the moment while adding more offense to his very strong defensive game.
Barkov and Rodrigues Shootout Winners:
While it was disappointing to see the Flyers tie the game off such an unlucky goal and an unfruitful OT, the Panthers pushed things to a shootout. Unsurprisingly, the Captain got Florida started in the shootout. It was a beautiful one-handed shot by Barkov, who used speed to move in towards the Ersson. Barkov looked like he was going to make one shot, then dropped his left hand to use his right to make the shot that went straight in the net and put the Cats up early. Reinhart, Lundell, and Tkachuk all had their shots saved, so the shootout was still tied, heading into Evan Rodrigues’ chance. Rodrigues came in with speed and made a fake to the right to pull Ersson just enough to give himself more net to shoot at. The result was a great backhand shot that went high into the net and gave the Panthers the advantage. Rodrigues also earned first-star honors with a three-point game, one goal, and two assists. A final save from Bobrovsky put the game away, and Florida got the extra point, putting their points total at 23. The Cats sit atop the Eastern Conference at the moment and are second in the league only to Winnipeg
.Florida’s back in action on Tuesday against the New Jersey Devils for the first in a pair of home games this week.
