George Richards, FHN Publisher
The Florida Panthers bounced back after suffering their first loss in regulation as they secured yet another one-goal win, this one 2-1 over the visiting Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday night.
Florida, which lost to these Wings 4-1 on Sunday evening, have won three of four meetings between the two so far this season with another trip to the Motor City coming next week.
In between that, however, come four games against the Tampa Bay Lightning and Carolina Hurricanes.
Three of those are against the defending champs, a team Florida rarely does well against.
The Panthers are now 7-1-2 — a great start to be sure — but we’re going to find out a lot about this team starting now.
Tuesday, Detroit opened to a 1-0 lead but the Panthers found the equalizer from Alex Wennberg off a nice feed from Jonathan Huberdeau.
Aaron Ekblad, who grew up in the Detroit area and has traditionally had great games against his boyhood team, gave the Panthers the lead when his heavy shot from the right circle hit Patric Hornqvist in the upper chest and went past goalie Thomas Greiss.
With the goal, Hornqvist tied Carter Verhaeghe for the team lead with six goals each.
”We responded to what was an ordinary game the other day on Super Bowl Sunday,’’ coach Joel Quenneville said.
”The guys responded yesterday with a good effort in practice, they were focused going into the game today. I thought we got better as the period went on in the first and our second had an excellent start. …
“I think we’re comfortable in these types of games and it’s not because we’re patient. It’s being out there and trusting everyone and everyone gets a turn and they’re getting the job done.”
While Greiss was tough against the Panthers as usual, Sergei Bobrovsky needed a bounceback win after losing to Nashville last Thursday and got it here.
Sunday’s game: Detroit Red Wings 4, Florida Panthers 1
Even though Detroit scored early off a defensive lapse, Bobrovsky stayed right with it and ended with 31 saves to improve to 4-0-1.
”I felt good. It was nice to be back, nice to play, nice to see some puck,’’ Bobrovsky said.
“I thought the guys did a good job. Early on, I was scrambling a little bit so I wanted to go out, keep up my pace and go higher in intensity, be faster. In the beginning, as I said, scrambling but the guys helped me out. Good win for us, for sure.”
Said Quenneville: ”I thought he responded to how the game started. He had a real big big sequence in the second, three big shots in a row. He was rock solid in the third and had some looks down the barrel. He had to make some big saves, timely saves as well.
”This is one of those games where when you look back, goaltending was a factor in getting the win. So that’s good for Bob and us as well.”
More lineup changes
The Panthers switched up their lineup a smidge between Sunday and Tuesday.
Brett Connolly, who appeared to be out of the lineup after practicing with the non-game group Monday, was on the fourth line.
Joining Connolly on the fourth was Ryan Lomberg, who had been out since the opener against Chicago. He was officially activated to the main roster from the taxi squad earlier in the day.
Noah Juulsen was also out as Markus Nutivaara returned to play on the second pairing with Anton Stralman.
First period highlights
Anthony Duclair is going to score a goal one of these days but after the first period Tuesday, he has to be wondering if that is true or not.
Duclair had four high-end scoring chances in the opening period — including a wrap-around attempt in which the puck skidded along the goal line and out of harms way — but came away with nothing but an understanding pat on the back.
Detroit took a 1-0 lead 3:31 into the game when Filip Zadina scored off a pass from Dylan Larkin.
That goal was set up when MacKenzie Weegar’s soft clear at center ice was picked off by Larkin and Detroit was off to the races.
Credit Weegar for getting back in position to challenge the Zadina shot, but it was a tough period for the Florida defenseman.
Detroit got the only power play chance of the first 23 seconds into the game when Weegar was charged for hooking.
The Wings only got off one shot — with Florida getting the best scoring chance as Ekblad’s charging backhand off a Sasha Barkov pass was stopped.
Ekblad’s shorthanded shot was one of a handful of Grade A scoring chances for the Panthers in the first.
Following that came Duclair’s unlucky roll as well as two point blank shots that went high.
Noel Acciari had a prime chance but he couldn’t connect on a rebound in the slot.
Florida did get a goal and forced a 1-1 game when Wennberg got his second in as many nights, blasting a sweet pass from Huberdeau through traffic at 15:54.
The Panthers outshot the Wings 9-7 in the first with a 16-11 lead in shot attempts.
Duclair had four shot attempts (two misses, two blocked) but no shots on goal in the period.
Second period highlights
The Panthers did a good job in the second of keeping possession time although the scoring chances were not as numerous as they were in the first.
Florida finally got to roll out its power play unit at 6:25 of the period and cashed in in the closing seconds.
After a nice bit of puck movement, Sasha Barkov found Ekblad at the top of the right circle.
His rocket hit Hornqvist square in the sternum and deflected past Greiss to make it 2-1.
”It was fine, it hit my equipment so I was lucky on that one,” Hornqvist said. “It always hurts a little less when the puck goes in.”
The shots for both sides were pretty even as Bobrovsky went into the third with 14 consecutive saves following the Zadina goal which opened the scoring.
Third period highlights
The Panthers did not get to do a whole lot in the third what with a couple of penalties on Keith Yandle and Ekblad the spoil the flow of things.
Detroit came hard after Bobrovsky and the Panthers but were not able to get anything through.
The Wings went 0-for-3 on the power play Tuesday.
”They had some zonetime on us and we had some fortunate blocks or recoveries and Bob was big on second opportunities around the net,” Quenneville said.
”We had a couple of challenging kills there and it could have been the difference in the game. Our power play goal was huge with Hornqvist at the net, we had zone time the entire time so that was a positive.”
with 1:45 left, Hornqvist couldn’t handle a pass from Huberdeau at the doorstep that would have extended the lead.
Up Next: Tampa Bay Lightning at Florida Panthers
When: Thursday, 7 p.m.
Where: BB&T Center, Sunrise
Tickets: Available HERE
TV/Radio: FSF/560-AM