In Toronto, the Maple Leafs found themselves on the wrong end of a 5-3 score with the Florida Panthers on Monday night.
The Panthers struck for four goals i the third period to take the win.
Worse for the Leafs, they lost Frederik Andersen to an upper body injury.
“He’s feeling better from what I’m told, but we’re just going to have to give him the night and see how he is in the morning,” Maple Leafs head coach Sheldon Keefe said.
Andersen did submit to concussion protocol and reportedly passed the tests.
Sergei Bobrovsky made 31 saves to get the win for Florida.
Mark Pysyk struck for his first NHL hat trick for the Panthers.
“We didn’t play up to where we should have in the first two periods,” Pysyk said. “We got a little energy going after the second. We didn’t do much that period, so we wanted to come out firing. After giving up that first one (early in the third), we could have rolled over and died but everybody on the bench knew just to dig in and we bounced back and took it to them. It’s a huge win. It was a big game, we knew that coming in.”
John Tavares, William Nylander and Auston Matthews were the Maple Leafs strikers.
“It’s obviously disappointing. It’s not going to be a good feeling leaving the rink especially overall the way we played,” Tavares said. “We got sloppy early in the third and didn’t do a good enough job exiting the zone clean and gave up a lot of opportunities.”
Jonathan Huberdeau and Mike Hoffman also scored for the Panthers.
“We didn’t panic. That’s our team, that’s how we win games,” Huberdeau said. “We came back 3-2, 3-3 and then after that we had the momentum and we knew it and we took advantage of it.”
[WATCH: All Panthers vs. Maple Leafs highlights]
Andersen, who left the game in the first period, made seven saves and yielded one goal.
Michael Hutchinson iced the remainder of the game and made 10 saves.
“I thought we played a really good game,” Keefe said. “If we play that type of game 100 times, I think we win it 99 of those times, something in that neighborhood. The result [stinks], but I don’t think it’s indicative of how the game went.
“That’s the best defensive game we’ve played all season. I don’t think we gave up more than four scoring chances at even strength the whole game.”
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