Fall behind by three scores and no matter the sport, it is a difficult hole to climb out.
That happened to the Nashville Predators on Thursday night as they fell behind 0-3 to the visiting Florida Panthers.
Aaron Ekblad had two goals, including the game-winner, and four points in a 5-4 Panthers win.
“I thought [Ekblad] had a great game,” Florida coach Joel Quenneville said. “He did everything right on both ends, terrific goal on the power play that put us in a really good spot. Did a lot of good things. It was one of those nights where he had the magic touch.”
Sergei Bobrovsky made 31 saves in the win.
Filip Forsberg, Mattias Ekholm, and Colton Sissons rallied Nashville back to within 3-5.
“We come out and we’re slow, they’re obviously playing way better than us in the first,” Forsberg said. “That kind of puts yourself in a bad spot. After that, I think in the second period, we were starting to play the right way. And obviously in the third again, desperation kicks in and we’re playing great. We’re creating chances and had a couple more chances that could’ve went in, two goals that were disallowed. We’ve just got to play like that from the start.”
Ryan Johansen, also scored for the Predators to close the final gap to one-goal at 5-4.
Carter Verhaeghe, Mason Marchment and Jonathan Huberdeau scored for the 3-0 lead the Panthers built early in the game.
“It was definitely special,” Marchment said. “I had a good opportunity to score the shift before that too. I tried to go high, and this time just tried to go low. Lucky it went in, and it was an awesome experience.”
The Preds dropped to 10-13-0.
“You look at tonight, it could have been three or four to nothing in the first probably seven minutes of the game,” Nashville head coach John Hynes said. “In tonight’s game, we gave up odd-man rushes, our [defensemen] were pinching at the wrong time
s, our forwards had to reload a little bit more. It comes to the urgency that you need to be able to play with to establish the game.”
Pekka Rinne made 33 saves in the loss.
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