Author: Buffalo Winter

Cats Conquer

FLA 3 – SC 2 OT  The Panthers continue to defy and defeat and Florida’s first home game of the Finals proved to be the tonic required to get their skates back under them.

Perhaps by earning lesser penalties, the Panthers would significantly improve their chances of capturing the Cup with Florida the second most penalized team in the regular season and now leading this year’s playoffs in penalties they are gift-wrapping power plays for the Knights.

Mr. Hill allowed all goals at even strength producing a .870 save percentage and Mr. Bobrovsky was scored on only during the power play and one was at 4 on 3 earning a solid .926 save percentage for the Cats.

Game Four is scheduled this Saturday night and the puck drops at eight o’clock EST.

Cats Crumble

Knights 7 – Panthers 2 Last night was another disappointing effort in net, with more misconduct penalties earned, and if Florida does not turn it around at home they will become the 21^st team and the first team this century to be swept in the Finals.

The Knights played another solid defensive game blocking over 40 shots and offensively scored twice on the power play with Mr. Marchessault and Mr. Howden both scoring twice.

Mr. Tkachuk laid an awesome helmet-popping check that caused a stir as the recipient left the game but was on the bench for the third and contributed an assist just a couple minutes in so thankfully Mr. Eichel and his neck seem to be fine.

Leaving desert temperatures in the 90s and arriving in the 70s with rain the series resumes in Florida this Thursday evening at 8pm EST.

Game One

Knights 5 – Panthers 2 Florida scored first on a shorthanded effort by Mr. Staal and the Knights scored on one of their two power plays of the period to tie the game at one with less than three minutes in the first period.

In the second period, Mr. Theodore scored his first of the playoffs after dangling around Mr. Duclair at the blue line then nine minutes later Mr. Duclair got that one back on an unassisted goal (4) with 10 seconds remaining in the period tied at two.

The third period was messy with eight penalties and three misconducts and before the festivities began the Knights scored twice to take a 4-2 lead with the fourth goal challenged for high-sticking that failed and goal five on the power-play scored with a couple minutes left in the game.

Game Two is scheduled for Monday night at 8pm EST either Mr. Bobrovsky and the Panthers pounce back or the Knights will take a 2-0 series lead.

Unpredictable Panthers

The Florida Panthers barely got into the 2023 NHL playoffs and not one pundit prognosticator predicted they would advance, especially after falling behind 3-1 in the series versus the greatest regular season team in NHL History backstopped by a Vezina candidate, but they did.

In the second round, the Panthers held the high-flying Leafs to two goals in each of the five games and won all three overtime games as Florida advanced past Toronto to face the second-best regular season team in the next round.

Round three began with an emotionally and physically draining four-overtime contest that gave the visiting Panthers the series lead which they took full advantage of in a stunning sweep of Carolina as Florida played another offense-smothering series where the Hurricanes averaged two goals per game.

What the Florida Panthers can become by winning Lord Stanley’s silver chalice is no less than “the greatest road team in Stanley Cup History”…if they win.

Their path to the Finals

The Pacific Division Champions and number one seed in the West began their route to the Cup finals by absorbing a 5-1 beat down courtesy of the Jets before scoring twice as many goals as Winnipeg over the next four victories to advance.

The Conference semi-finals highlighted the Knights versus Edmonton a team they edged out for the division title by one win and beat in the first game of the series in a 10-goal game.

Each team split at home and the one-goal victory in game five on top of scoring three more goals than the Oilers in game six provided the series victory for the Knights and a trip to the Conference Finals.

When the Knights won the first two home games in OT and then shut out the Stars in game three most fans were thinking sweep but Dallas won a double overtime and then doubled up the score on the road to win their second in a row against the Knights.

The Knights proved to be the true road warriors in the series as they crushed any hope the Stars had to advance with a dominating six-goal shutout all-around team effort to propel themselves to the Stanley Cup Finals.