Florida Panthers lose, go into All-Star break feeling pretty good

NEW YORK — After an eight-game showing on Monday, the Florida Panthers flamed out in their last game before their two-week All-Star break, falling 5-2 to the New York Rangers.

They have no reason to be discouraged, however.

Florida heads into the break with a league-best 69 points.

“We’ve been having some great games, it’s fun to see that everyone is chipping in,” Anthony Duclair said.

“It’s not just a couple of guys, it’s the whole team from top to bottom, everyone’s been playing great, the goalies have been solid — making key saves in key moments — and it’s fun to play right now.”

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The Panthers played the second-most games out of any team with 47, but managed to crunch out 32 wins and a .734 points percentage that ranks third in the NHL.

“I think, for the most part, we’ve played really well. We played a lot of hockey,” Panthers interim coach Andrew Brunette said.

“It was a lot of travel and we were starting to run on fumes a little bit tonight, but our guys have done an unbelievable job of bringing energy night in and night out.”

It was apparent that the team looked a little beat in the third period.

During that period, the Rangers outshot the Panthers 10-7, out-chanced them 9-6 and beat them 4-0 in high-danger chances.

“I thought our start was really good, but I think where the puck luck stopped following us around was the second goal,” Brunette said.

“I just felt we had trouble rebounding off that, we had a power play and a few different opportunities, but we didn’t really have the energy after that one.”

That goal Brunette was referring to occurred when Alexis Lafreniere snuck behind the Florida defense and slipped a backhand shot through Spencer Knight’s five-hole to tie the game up at two.

Florida had just gotten the momentum back after recovering from a Mika Zibanejad goal just 35 seconds into the game.

They controlled play from that point on in the first period, with Anthony Duclair scoring 10:44 into the game to tie it up.

The Panthers carried the momentum into the second when Sam Reinhart capitalized off of a Sasha Barkov rebound to give Florida the lead 2:18 into the second period.

That was the last time Florida had the lead.

Chris Kreider notched a power play goal from the front of the net with 2:35 to go in the second period to give New York a 3-2 lead.

They controlled play for the majority of the period, but could not break through quite easily.

That changed when Mason Marchment took a high-sticking penalty with 6:18 to go.

Kreider got his second goal of the game with yet another net-front tap-in to make it a two-goal game with 5:21 to go.

The Panthers established some momentum after pulling Knight with 3:30 remaining, but another penalty put a damper on any comeback efforts.

“I thought we got into a little penalty trouble at the end there,” MacKenzie Weegar said.

“We were gonna have a big push there in the last five minutes, but who knows what could have happened.”

What actually happened was an empty-net goal from Artemi Panarin with 41 seconds left to ensure a Rangers victory.

Florida will not play again until Feb. 16, when they head to Raleigh to face off against the Carolina Hurricanes.

During that layover, the team will take a break for a little bit over a week, returning to practice from the All-Star break on Friday, Feb. 11.

“Guys are going to see family and friends and maybe blow off some steam,” Weegar said.

“It’s a long break, so I expect guys to stay prepared and stay focused on the final stretch here, we want to put ourselves in a good position.”

FLORIDA PANTHERS ON DECK

FLORIDA PANTHERS AT CAROLINA HURRICANES

• WHEN: Feb, 16, 7:30 p.m.
• WHERE: PNC Arena, Raleigh, N.C.
• TICKETS: CLICK HERE
• TV/STREAMING: TNT
• RADIO: WQAM 560-AM
• Last season: Carolina won 6-0-2
• All-time regular season series: Carolina leads 69-45-9, 11 ties
• This season: @Florida 5, Carolina 2 (Nov. 6), Florida 4, @Carolina 3 OT (Jan. 8)