SUNRISE — It seems the Panthers simply wanted to come back residence.
After dropping back-to-back video games in Toronto to begin their second-round collection with the Maple Leafs, the Panthers took two straight video games in Dawn, night the collection at two video games every with a 2-0 win over Toronto on Sunday.
Florida will play at Toronto in Sport 5 at 7 p.m. on Wednesday.
“It’s large,” ahead Sam Bennett mentioned. “We did an amazing job of displaying our composure, and we settled down at residence. We performed two a lot better video games. And … it’s now a best-of-three, and it’s going to be a enjoyable finish to the collection.”
Carter Verhaeghe put the Panthers on the board with 4:15 left within the first interval — a sluggish begin to the scoring on this collection. Florida was on its fourth energy play of the sport after former Panther Oliver Ekman-Larsson went to the field for delay of recreation. Verhaeghe obtained a cross from Matthew Tkachuk immediately in entrance of the online and buried the one-time shot.
Florida had quite a few good probabilities to increase its lead, however the Panthers both missed their targets or couldn’t corral their alternatives. After they did, Maple Leafs goalie Joseph Woll did a superb job of stymieing Florida. The Toronto netminder ended the sport with a .944 save share.
“He was nice,” Toronto coach Craig Berube mentioned. “I assumed he performed a superb recreation. All these [power plays] that they had within the first — he was a giant motive that it was solely 1-0.”
Fortuitously for the Panthers, goalie Sergei Bobrovsky was as much as the duty of matching Woll’s efficiency. Bobrovsky confronted fewer photographs, however he didn’t enable any of them to cross by him.
“Bob was extremely stable tonight, and I believe he’s our spine of our workforce,” defenseman Nate Schmidt mentioned. “All the time has been. And also you don’t actually respect his expertise till you get to play with him.”
The Panthers’ protection, which surrendered 13 objectives by the primary three video games of the collection, tightened up and allowed solely 23 photographs.
“I assumed our gaps have been good,” Florida coach Paul Maurice mentioned. “I assumed our forwards did some actually fantastic work, permitting that to occur. Such a dynamic workforce, Toronto … when you don’t do sufficient work from the purpose line to your pink line, you’re going to essentially put the protection in a really, very tough place.”
Bennett, who leads Florida with 5 objectives this postseason, gave the Panthers some insurance coverage. After defenseman Aaron Ekblad pressured a turnover, Bennett gained a race for a free puck, deked Woll and sunk his shot with 7:50 left within the third interval.
“Once I was taking it down, I used to be all my choices,” Bennett mentioned. “I used to be passing first, after which I used to be taking pictures. I simply didn’t see both of these open up and was in a position to simply maintain onto it and wait him out a bit bit, after which I used to be in a position to put it in.”
The sport didn’t finish with out drama. Because the groups scrummed alongside the boards because the clock approached zero within the third interval, Toronto middle Max Domi hit Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov into the boards.
Maurice mentioned Barkov will probably be OK.
“I believe the league seems at these issues very intently, particularly at that time within the recreation,” Maurice mentioned. “And that’s their job.”
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