In Detroit, the visiting Florida Panthers pushed their season-opening point-streak with a 3-2 win over the Red Wings Sunday evening.
Chris Driedger made 32 saves in the win.
“They came out hot, but after the first period, we buckled down,” Driedger said. “We’ve been down in almost every game, but no one is giving up. This group has a great attitude.”
Dylan Larkin staked the Wings to an early 1-0 lead.
“We had a great start to the game, but we just didn’t generate anything in the second period,” Larkin said. “That just killed our momentum, and then we hit a couple posts and a crossbar in the third period.”
Anthony Mantha also scored for Detroit.
Patric Hornqvist, Aaron Ekblad and Carter Verhaeghe were the Panthers’ strikers.
It was only the second regulation win of the campaign for the Panthers. 
“That finally happened,” the Panthers’ cAleksander Barkov said. “We’ve been working hard as a group, and we have gotten great outcomes. It feels like a fresh start for us, and we’re only going to get better.”
Florida improved to 5-0-1 to start the season.
“Detroit came out strong and scored right off the bat, but we caught up to the pace,” Panthers head coach Joel Quenneville said. “We got a couple of lines going, and that’s important for us. We’re not a one-line team.”
Thomas Greiss made 27 saves in the loss.
“The game is always going to go back and forth. We’re not going to be able to control 60 minutes against a solid team like Florida like we did in the first period,” Red Wings head coach Jeff Blashill said. “But it certainly hurts to keep having to kill penalties, especially when we’ve been scored on too many times during the penalty kill.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.