With only two weeks left until the start of the 2022 Stanley Cup playoffs, the Florida Panthers are playing as well as they have at any point this season — and nearly as well as they ever have in their history.
With a stout performance in goal from Spencer Knight and four goals in less than 10 minutes in the second period, Florida blew out the Detroit Red Wings, 6-1, on Sunday in Michigan for its season-best 10th straight victory.
It ties the longest winning streak in the NHL this season and is the second double-digit winning streak in team history. The Panthers (54-15-6) are two wins away from tying the franchise record for consecutive wins, which they set when they won 12 in a row in the 2015-16 NHL season.
They also can clinch home-ice advantage in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs as early as Tuesday, and would guarantee themselves first place in both the Atlantic Division and Eastern Conference with three more wins — maybe fewer depending on how the second-place Toronto Maple Leafs fare in the first few days of the week.
There’s a reason Florida is the favorite to come out of the East and a legitimate contender for the Stanley Cup, and a performance like this one is why.
It starts with the offense and the Panthers blew away the Red Wings with one electrifying 10-minute stretch in the second period in Detroit. First, winger Anthony Duclair scored on a one-timer from star center Aleksander Barkov with 14:58 left and forward Sam Reinhart scored on another one-timer 90 seconds later off an assist by winger Mason Marchment.
After a nearly eight-minute lull, Florida scored twice more in the final five minutes of the period with centers Anton Lundell and Maxim Mamin scoring just 28 seconds apart.
For more than 25 minutes, the Red Wings (29-37-10)cr shut out Florida and then the Panthers made the game a blowout with four goals in 9:49, silencing the crowd of 14,586 at Little Caesars Arena.
It was Florida’s 12th four-goal period of the season. No one else in the NHL has more than nine this year.
For those first 25 minutes, the out-of-contention Red Wings did mostly match first-place Florida, though. The Panthers had a narrow 13-12 edge in shots on goal at the end of the first period and Detroit quickly built a 17-13 lead in shots after it started the second period by getting multiple chances on a power play.
Knight, however, was spectacular between the pipes and kept the game scoreless until Florida’s inevitable eruption. The 20-year-old rookie, who has spent most of the year as star goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky’s backup after he began the season as a potential Calder Memorial Trophy favorite, stopped 33 of 34 shots — and came 7:56 away from his second career shutout — to continue his spectacular second half.
The Panthers sent Knight down to the American Hockey League for most of February with Bobrovsky playing well and the schedule — with its extended All-Star break — not providing many opportunities for Knight to get in the game. The goaltender returned to the NHL in March and has won nine games with a .926 save percentage since.
Florida continues to insist Bobrovsky will be the unquestioned starter come the Cup playoffs and Bobrovsky’s play has mostly justified it this year — he set the Panthers’ single-season wins record Friday. Instead, Knight gives Florida one of the best backups in the league and makes goaltending a potential postseason strength for the Panthers after it was ultimately their undoing in the first round of the 2021 Stanley Cup playoffs.
In the third period, Florida added one more goal by turning defense into offense.
With about 15 minutes remaining and the Panthers trying to kill a penalty, Barkov stripped Calder Trophy-contending winger Lucas Raymond in the neutral zone, then muscled his way past defenseman Moritz Seider — the Calder favorite — to get to the edge of the crease, where he dropped a pass back between his legs to set up Lundell for a shorthanded goal and 5-0 lead.
Florida generated 35 scoring chances on one end of the ice and held the Red Wings to eight 5-on-5 high-danger chances on the other, and Knight stood up to nearly every one.
With seven games left in the regular season, the Panthers lead the league with 4.19 goals per game and — for the moment — moved up to 11th in defense with 2.85 goals allowed.
