In Sunrise, the Panthers needed another rally on Wednesday night.
T.J. Oshie hit for a double and Justin Schultz added a single maker for the Washington Capitals who held a 3-0 lead early in the middle frame.
“We’ve have to shake this one off,” Oshie said. “I think we’re still showing ourselves how we have to play and creating chances, creating offense, keeping their offense in check. We keep getting away from it. We have to reset here. Obviously, you don’t want to be down 3-2, especially when we felt like we had a chance to go up 3-1 in the last game. We’ve got a veteran group in there, a bunch of guys with a lot of great character. We’ll be a little [upset] here tonight, wake up tomorrow, head home and get back to work.”
Unfortunately for the Caps, the Panthers reeled off five unanswered goals to win, 5-3 and take a 3-2 lead in Game 5.
“It took us a while,” Florida coach Andrew Brunette said. “Give them credit. They came out and played hard and we weren’t too invested early for some reason, which is concerning. It took us a while to be get dragged into the fight.
“But with our group, we’ve been there. I really felt we were skating there, and I thought we started taking over the game like we’ve done so many times this year and showed our resiliency and belief that we’re in any hockey game.”
Game 6 is set for Washington, DC< on Friday.
“It’s a point shot that missed the net and comes out on the other side for an empty-netter,” the Panthers’ Patric Hornqvist said. “That’s hockey. Washington had the game before that. After that goal, I think we took over and in the third, we just kept rolling the lines and doing the right things. So just playing the right way. That’s going to be our mindset from now on and when we do that, I like our chances.”
Sergei Bobrovsky made 30 saves in the Panthers win.
Carter Verhaeghe, Hornqvist, and Sam Reinhart scored in the middle frame to help the Panthers rally for a 3-3 tie leading to the third period.
“Things are going pretty well right now for me and the team,” Verhaeghe said. “We’re up 3-2. We have two chances to win one game, so things are looking pretty good.”
Verhaeghe also added three assists in the win.
Verhaeghe scored again in the third period for a 4-3 lead.
“There were two games that were played,” Washington coach Peter Laviolette said. “There was the game to push it to 3-0 where I liked everything we did, including the power play and the penalty kill and the 5-on-5 play, and then there was the game that took place after that, where if you play against a team like Florida that is a high-octane team, we are just feeding them and we can’t. We’ve got to get back to that first part of that game, and you’ve got to play it consistently for 60 minutes.”
Claude Giroux added a marker in the 16th minute of the third for a 5-3 advantage.
Ilya Samsonov made 33 saves in the Caps loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.