Brandon Montour scored two goals in the third period on Wednesday night, and Carter Verhaeghe notched the game winner all part of a four goal outburst in the final 20 minutes as the Florida Panthers evened their NHL Eastern Conference First Round series with the Boston Bruins with a 6-3 victory in game two at TD Garden.
It was a scoreless first period, but Boston did a much better job in carrying play after being outshot 15-8 in the opening stanza in game one on Monday night the Bruins outshot Florida 12-9 in the opening 20 minutes. The B’s had one powerplay, and then got another in the late stages that had 53 seconds of time left that carried over into the second period.
Florida killed that Boston opportunity off, and then shortly after the Panthers would be the first to score. After a Bruins turnover near their own blue line, Matthew Tkachuk trickled a lead pass to Sam Bennett into the low slot and a shot by Bennett squeezed past Linus Ullmark at 1:42. Later in the period, Brad Marchand would be the beneficiary of a Florida turnover shorthanded. Tomas Nosek forced that miscue and then sent a tape to tape pass from the right corner to Marchand just coming off the bench at full speed, as he skated into the high slot and went far side past the glove of Alex Lyon at 12:13 to make it 1-1. It didn’t take the guests long to regain their lead as just 2:05 later Eric Staal took a nice feed from Nick Cousins and fired a quick wristshot blocker side on Ullmark and into the net from the high slot. Boston had the equalizer again before the end of the period on the tail end of a powerplay at 17:01, as a shot that was going wide by Pavel Zacha hit the skate of Tyler Bertuzzi and deflected in for the extra man tally.
Florida for a third time would take the lead just 22 seconds into the third period, as a shot by Montour from just inside the blue line beat a screened Ullmark stick side. Boston got a powerplay less than a minute later and had two great chances to equalize once again. David Pastrnak had a good look on a one timer and had plenty of net to shoot at, but fired it wide. Charlie McAvoy also had an open shot from the high slot just inside the blue line that hit the crossbar behind Lyon. Several minutes later, a turnover by McAvoy in his own zone led to a beautiful set up from Tkachuk to Verhaeghe for the eventual game winner. Verhaeghe from the left faceoff circle fired it in past a sprawling Ullmark at 7:00 to make it 4-2. The Panthers added two more for good measure as Montour scored his second of the period at 12:30, and Eetu Luostarinen buried an empty netter at 17:35 as Florida heads back home with the series even 1-1. The Bruins got one back from Taylor Hall late when the game was already decided.
Montour had the two goals and Tkachuk along with Cousins had two assists each in the win for Florida. Lyon made 33 saves. For Montour it was his first two career playoff goals after 38 postseason games. No Boston players had more than one point in the loss, and Ullmark stopped 24 shots. The Panthers went 0-2 on the powerplay, while the Bruins were 1-4. Boston has now scored a powerplay goal in 14 straight home playoff games, two short of tying the New York Islanders who did that in 16 straight in the two Stanley Cup Championship years of 1980 and 1981. Marchand now has 51 playoff goals in his career, four shy of the franchise leader Cam Neely (55). The black and gold had their nine game win streak snapped in the defeat, and once again played without their captain Patrice Bergeron (upper body injury). Game three at FLA Live Arena in Sunrise, Florida is set for Friday at 7:30 p.m.
Story by Chris Lessner/Video highlights courtesy of NHL website
