Florida Panthers Celebrate End of Hurricane Season, Rout Carolina

SUNRISE — The Florida Panthers, who just days ago were on the cusp of despair and in the throes of a four-game losing streak, have quickly turned their fortunes around. A couple wins against the Carolina Hurricanes have helped.

On Saturday, the Panthers got a pair of goals in the second period — including one at the buzzer — and Spencer Knight made 20 saves in a 6-0 win over the Hurricanes.

The Panthers, who have won three straight, beat the Hurricanes by a combined 12-3 over the past two days helped along by a three-goal outburst in the third that took all of 84 seconds.

Knight, meanwhile, got his first shutout of the season and first since making 40 saves against the Hurricanes back on Nov. 9, 2022.

It was the fourth shutout of Knight’s career.

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Anton Lundell appeared to give the Panthers a 1-0 lead after a scoreless first, only Carter Verhaeghe was offside and Carolina successfully challenged.

Aaron Ekblad did score, firing a sharp-angled shot from near the side wall with goalie Spencer Martin unable to get up off the ice following a previous scramble.

The Panthers took a 2-0 lead into the second intermission when Mackie Samoskevich was on the trailing end of a tic-tac-toe play started by Sasha Barkov and facilitated by Matthew Tkachuk.

Sam Bennett made it 3-0 on a turnover midway through the third, the Panthers scored three times in less than 90 seconds, and that was that.

HOW THEY SCORED

• Panthers 1, Hurricanes 0 (6:42 2nd): Aaron Ekblad gets his first regular-season goal since Feb. 20 by rifling a shot with Spencer Martin scrambling, and failing, to get up off the ice.
• Panthers 2, Hurricanes 0 (19:59 2nd PP): Sasha Barkov threaded a pass from the left circle to Matthew Tkachuk sitting on the right side of the post. Tkachuk quickly got it to Mackie Samoskevich for the easy tic-tac-toe goal with just 0.8 left on the clock.
• Panthers 3, Hurricanes 0 (8:19 3rd): Anton Lundell forces a turnover along the side wall, gets it to Eetu Luostarinen who feeds Sam Bennett for his 12th goal of the season.
• Panthers 4, Hurricanes 0 (11:37 3rd PP): Tkachuk freezes Martin again, and Barkov cashes in.
• Panthers 5, Hurricanes 0 (11:48 3rd): Moments later, Adam Boqvist got his first with the Panthers with a sharp backhanded on the rush.
• Panthers 6, Hurricanes 0 (13:01 3rd PP): Evan Rodrigues deflects a point shot from Nate Schmidt and scores against replacement goalie Yaniv Perets.

FHN’S 3 STARS OF THE GAME

• 1. Spencer Knight, Florida
• 2. Aaron Ekblad, Florida
• 3. Matthew Tkachuk, Florida

ON DECK: GAME 26

FLORIDA PANTHERS AT PITTSBURGH PENGUINS

• When: Tuesday, 7 p.m.
• Where: PPG Arena, Pittsburgh 
• Local TV: Scripps Sports — WSFL 39 (Miami/FTL); WHDT 9 (WPB); LAFF 36.3 (Naples/FTM)
• Streaming: Panthers+, ESPN+
• Radio: WPOW 96.5-FM2; WBZT 1230-AM (Palm Beach); WCTH 100.3-FM (Florida Keys); SiriusXM
• Panthers Radio Streaming: SiriusXM 932, NHL App
• Season Series — At Florida: Jan. 3; March 23. At Pittsburgh: Tuesday.
• Last Season: Panthers won 3-0
• All-time Regular Season Series: Penguins lead 56-38-8, 4 ties
• All-time Playoff Series: Florida d. Pittsburgh 4-3, 1996 Eastern Conference finals
• Up Next for the Panthers: Thursday at Philadelphia Flyers, 7 p.m.