(Sunrise) The Washington Capitals came from behind with three third-period goals to defeat the Florida Panthers 4-2 on Tuesday in Game 1 of their NHL First Round series.
Posted at 10:31 p.m.
TJ Oshie and Evgeny Kuznetsov flashed the red light twice in the space of two minutes and 23 seconds and allowed the Capitals to maintain a lead for the ten minutes remaining in the duel.
The Presidents’ Trophy champions hadn’t lost in regulation time this season after leading after two periods until tonight. The Panthers were 22-0-0 at home in those kinds of scenarios and 39-0-1 overall.
Vitek Vanecek made 30 saves in the win. Ilya Samsonov, who shared the net with Vanecek throughout the campaign, served as backup.
Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 34 shots for the Panthers. Spencer Knight, who netted for Games 5 and 6 of their series against the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2020-21, was benched.
The second matchup is Thursday in Florida.
Tom Wilson pounced on the returning Anthony Mantha shot to give the Capitals the lead early in the game.
Sam Bennett tied the game with an accurate shot late in the first period.
A few seconds after the start of the middle period, Claude Giroux skilfully picked a return to push the puck into a gaping cage. Jonathan Huberdeau and Brandon Montour were accomplices of the net.
In the third period, MacKenzie Weegar tried to get out of the zone by carrying the disc to the center of the ice, but Alex Ovechkin gave him a shoulder strike which knocked him down. His fall allowed Kuznetsov to escape and the Capitals center then beat Bobrovsky with a shot into the top corner.
Just two minutes later, Oshie redirected Nicklas Backstrom’s pass behind Bobrovsky and restored the lead to the Capitals.
Lars Eller completed the job with an empty net goal.