SUNRISE, Fla. — Sunrise has gotten used to seeing come-from-behind wins this season. It’s usually just the Florida Panthers executing them.
Not this week. For the second time in three days, the Panthers blew a lead on home ice and fell to the Columbus Blue Jackets, 6-3, in Florida.
The Panthers scored in the first nine minutes, then gave up a game-tying goal later in the first period and surrendered the go-ahead score with 10:28 left in the second. Florida, which leads the NHL with five home wins when trailing at the second intermission, couldn’t pull off a comeback and dropped a second straight game at home for only the second time all season, and the previous two-game losing streak came when a significant chunk of the roster was sidelined by COVID-19.
In this season, a two-game losing streak on home ice counts as a reason for full-scale frustration, especially after the league’s highest scoring offense was uncharacteristically lifeless in front of the typically inspiring FLA Live Arena crowd.
Still, the Panthers (35-12-5) remain in first place in the Eastern Conference, but the Carolina Hurricanes, who have a better points percentage than Florida, will have a chance to pass them when they face the Blue Jackets on Friday in Raleigh, N.C. The Panthers also remain three points ahead of the Tampa Bay Lightning in the Atlantic Division.
Florida’s two losses, despite the blown leads, were starkly differently. On Tuesday, the Panthers fired 48 shots, scored four goals and held a lead in the final 10 minutes before the Nashville Predators stormed back to win. On Thursday, Florida managed only 28 5-on-5 shots on goal, while Columbus blocked 17 and outhit the Panthers, 42-27, to win a defensive struggle.
Even with the early goal, Florida never controlled the game in the matter it often does. The Panthers played the first half of the first period mostly in their defensive zone before one great shift from their top line — with star center Aleksander Barkov corralling loose pucks and extending the possession — got star defenseman MacKenzie Weegar a goal with 11:27 left for a 1-0 lead.
The Blue Jackets (27-23-1) scored less than seven minutes later, though, when Weegar turned the puck over near the blue line and Columbus winger Patrik Laine finished off a 2-on-1. Florida had only an 11-10 lead in shots on goal at the first intermission and was tied 1-1 with an opponent on the fringe of the playoff race.
With 10:28 left in the second period, the Blue Jackets took the lead for good when Columbus defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov took a slap shot from the point and Blue Jackets forward Boone Jenner deflected it past goaltender Jonas Johansson for a 2-1 lead.
Columbus’ lead swelled to 3-1 on a goal with 16:48 left and it was too much for Florida to overcome. Even after All-Star left wing Jonathan Huberdeau scored with 13:08 remaining to move back into a tie for the league lead in points, the Blue Jackets scored twice in the next 3:05 — 10 seconds apart — to blow the game open.
Panthers interim coach Andrew Brunette spent large chunks of the game — and even the pregame — tinkering to try to get his Panthers out of their sudden rut.
Brunette started Johansson for the first time all season after fellow goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky, who started the first four games in seven days after the All-Star break, had his worst full-game performance of the season Tuesday. He reinserted Frank Vatrano into the lineup, even slotting the winger up on the top line for his first action since Feb. 1. Before the first period was done, he briefly stuck Barkov and Huberdeau together, hoping his two best players would ignite the offense by lining up next to each other.
None of it worked, even if his desperation move to pull Johansson for an extra attacker with more than eight minutes left briefly gave South Florida hope at another comeback when forward Sam Bennett scored a 6-on-5 goal to cut Columbus’ lead to 5-3 with 6:29 left.
Twenty seconds later, the Blue Jackets scored in the empty net to push their lead back to 6-3 and bury the Panthers.
