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It was the second line of the Florida Panthers that led the way as each forward scored on the way to a, 4-1, win over the Vegas Golden Knights. Left-winger Carter Verhaeghe, center Sam Bennett, and right-winger Matthew Tkachuk all lit the lamp for Florida’s second line.
With the win the Panthers complete the season sweep of the Golden Knights on Thursday night as the other win came on Dec. 23 in Sunrise, Florida.
“I liked our start,” head coach Bruce Cassidy said. “We were ready to play. Second period I think it was just the special teams. The power play sucked the life out of us. Our best players on special teams got outplayed by their best players. From there, we weren’t able to get our game back.”
Next up for the Golden Knights, they will get set to welcome in the New York Islanders to T-Mobile Arena on Saturday, Jan. 6. Puck drop is set for 7 p.m.. It is the first of two meetings scheduled between the teams with the second game scheduled to take place Jan. 23 in New York.
With tonight’s loss, Vegas is now in second place of the Pacific Division Standings, sitting two points behind the Vancouver Canucks.
“I’m a coach so I’m concerned about everything,” Cassidy said. “At the end of the day, there’s going to be lulls in the season where your intensity doesn’t match the other teams’ but this has been way too long and for not long enough stretches where we are in it in games.”
Vegas has now lost six of their last seven games with none of those loses coming in overtime or a shootout.
“Twenty guys come to the rink everyday,” captain Mark Stone said. “Everybody has to play better. Forwards have to play better, defensemen have to play better, goalies have to play better.”
When looking at the goalie matchup in this one, Florida’s Sergei Bobrovsky came up with 26 saves on 27 shots faced and the win while Vegas’ Logan Thompson finished the game with 32 saves on 36 shots faced in what was his 11th loss in the last 17 starts.
The turning point of the game seemed to come in the second period when Vegas opened the period with about five minutes worth of power play time including multiple five-on-three chances that Vegas failed to convert on any of them and was held scoreless on the power play.
“Tonight, the game completely changed when we had a five-on-three for a minute and a half and I’m not sure we even had a good scoring chance,” Stone said. “They go 3-for-6, we go 0-for-6 and our power play really didn’t get us any momentum. Right now it’s just about finding different ways to score a goal.”
Florida controlled the shots in goal in the second period 14-5 and outscored the Knights 2-0 to grab control of the game and never look back.
The lone goal scorer for the Golden Knights Thursday night was second-year Pavel Dorofeyev who scored the game’s opening goal and was part of the quick start that Vegas got off to. The Knights opened the game with an 11-2 advantage in shots on goal.
Earlier today, center Jack Eichel was named as an All-Star for the 2024 NHL All-Star game taking place in early February. He was one of 32 players around the league named to this year’s All-Star game as one player from each team was announced as an All-Star today.
Eichel has racked up 16 goals while assisting on 24 other goals for a total of 40 this season.