Steve Gorten, Florida Hockey Now Writer
MacKenzie Weegar tried his best to put a positive spin on the grim scenario the Panthers face after losing Game 2 to the Lightning on Tuesday night.
“By all means, we’re not even close to [being] out of this series yet,” Weegar asserted after the 3-1 loss at BB&T Center. “No one’s hanging their heads here.”
After losing the first two games at home, they must now win four of five to prevail in this first-round playoff series against the defending Stanley Cup champions.
Three of those would be in Tampa.
Good luck.
“We’ve played great all year on the road,” Weegar noted, adding the Panthers need to stick together, stick with it, and maintain “positive vibes” heading into Game 3 Thursday.
“We’re going to move on to this next game, and we’re going to bring it to them in their own rink,” Weegar said.
The problem for the Panthers on Tuesday wasn’t effort.
Coach Joel Quenneville praised his team’s effort. And while they didn’t have the scoring opportunities they did in Sunday’s 5-4 loss in Game 1, they still had some “great looks.”
It’s just that “we couldn’t buy the goal we were looking for,” Quenneville said.
Their lone goal, which Mason Marchment scored at 14:21 of the second period, came on a feed from Carter Verhaeghe as Marchment was cutting across the low post. His first career playoff goal validated Quenneville’s decision to move him up to the top line from the fourth.
The Lightning didn’t score in the final two periods save for Yanni Gourde’s empty-netter with 1:25 left, and their two goals in the first period — Steven Stamkos’ wrist shot off the shin of Panthers defenseman Anton Stralman and Ondrej Palat’s rebound of Brayden Point’s shot off the crossbar — came on fortunate bounces.
“That’s kind of like the old story: you’ve got to earn your breaks,” Quenneville said.
“It’s definitely frustrating,” goalie Chris Driedger said. In games like that, you’d like to get a bounce yourself.”
Driedger, who made his first career playoff start on what also happened to be his 27th birthday, bore no blame for this loss. Quenneville made the decision to go with Driedger instead of Sergei Bobrovsky and Driedger was solid, stopping 26 of 28 shots.
“He kept us in the game and gave us a chance,” Quenneville said.
You figure Quenneville will stick with Driedger for Game 3, which creates an awkward situation considering Bobrovsky is in the second year of a seven-year, $70 million contract that, by the way, has a no-movement clause.
At the other end of the ice, the Panthers need to figure out how to reclaim their success against Lightning goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy, who the Panthers had tagged for at least four goals in each of the teams’ previous three matchups.
“The last game, we got a lot more pucks to the net, we moved a little better in the offensive zone and we created chances more than we did today,” center Sasha Barkov said.
“We’re going to make it harder on him [in Game 3],” Weegar promised.
Tuesday’s game was played a lot tighter than Sunday’s, which was more wide open and featured a lot of 4-on-4 and more power plays. The Lightning showed they can play, and win, with different styles.
So what can the Panthers change for Game 3?
For starters, playing a first period that more closely resembles Game 1 than 2.
“We fell asleep a couple of times, or made some mistakes either in the defensive zone or offensive zone,” Barkov said. “And [those mistakes] basically cost us the game because we couldn’t score more than one.”
Additionally, Quenneville said the Panthers need to play with more “purpose” without the puck. And “we’ve got to play a little more of a checking game, get pucks deep, grind them down like we did all season long,” Weegar said. “Grind them down like Marchie’s goal tonight.”
With his team’s season on the brink, don’t be surprised if there are more bold shake-ups from Quenneville on the heels of his goalie swap.
“We need more guys that are at their best, and to get that, we’re going to push every envelope we can to make sure we’re going to be the best we can going forward,” Quenneville said. “You’ve got to improve as the games go along. We’ve got to expect more.”