In Sunrise, the Florida Panthers’ Noel Acciari struck for a hat trick, his fist in the NHL, and the Panthers routed the visiting Ottawa Senators, 6-1.
“It’s an awesome feeling,” Acciari said. “[Huberdeau] found me backdoor; [Trocheck], those guys are fun to play with, easy to play with in how skilled they are. They can find you in areas you didn’t think they could, and easy tap-in goals there. It was a really exciting night.”
Sergei Bobrovsky made 29 saves in the win.
Artem Anisimov scored the lone Senators goal.
“Obviously, it’s not the way we wanted it to go,” Senators forward Logan Brown said. “It kind of slipped away from us there. We got away from our game, but I think we played hard in the third and started to get our game back for [Tuesday] night (at the Tampa Bay Lightning).”
Aleksander Barkov, Mike Matheson and Dominic Toninato added single markers for the Panthers who improved to 16-14-5.
“It was just a night that was working for our line,” Florida’s Jonathan Huberdeau said. “We played well. Obviously, [Acciari], unbelievable, hat trick. Really happy for him. With [Trocheck], I think we had a lot of chances. We played good. It was a great team effort.”
[WATCH: All Senators vs. Panthers highlights]
Anders Nilsson made 25 saves in the loss.
“We didn’t defend enough,” Senators coach D.J. Smith said. “I thought the first period we had good energy, but [then] they had three layups tonight, and that’s usually not the way we play. We’ve got to be harder in front of our net, and tonight we weren’t.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.