For the first time in 2025, the Florida Panthers have won consecutive games.
Interestingly, they both came against the same team.
Florida completed the sweep of their home-and-home with the Anaheim Ducks on Tuesday night, earning a 5-2 victory in Southern California.
Fans inside Honda Center were given something to cheer about early in the game when Evan Rodrigues was called for tripping at the 3:12 mark.
Former Panther Frank Vatrano would cash in off a smart pass from Troy Terry to give the Ducks a quick 1-0 lead.
It didn’t take long for the Cats to answer, with the top line taking care of business.
A steal at Anaheim’s blue line by Sasha Barkov led to a quick, pretty passing play from Barkov to Matthew Tkachuk to Sam Reinhart, with Reinhart making a nice move to his backhand to net his 28th goal of the season.
Goals by Evan Rodrigues and Carter Verhaeghe less than a minute apart gave Florida a sudden 3-1 lead with just over a minute left in the period, but a rush goal by Mason McTavish a mere 23 seconds later cut the Cats advantage quickly back down to one.
After a busy, five-goal, 27-shot opening period, things settled down slightly during the middle frame.
Sergei Bobrovsky and Lukas Dostal came up big when called upon, stopping the 17 combined shots during the second period and sending the game to the third with Florida clinging to their one-goal lead.
The Panthers changed that on the opening shift of the final frame, and it started on a turnover forced by rookie Mackie Samoskevich.
His steal turned into a primary assist for Sam Bennett, who scored for the first time in 21 games, to extend Florida’s lead to 4-2 just 19 seconds into the third period.
Defenseman Uvis Balinskis made it 5-2 Panthers at the 4:15 mark after showing off some nice skating and stickhandling skills at the Ducks blue line.
That would be all Bobrovsky and the Cats would need to earn their second win over Anaheim in as many games.
On to Los Angeles.
QUICK THOUGHTS
The Panthers are now 9-0-1 over their past 10 games against the Ducks.
Reinhart’s goal was his first in four games.
In 10 games this month, Reinhart has scored in four of them, but he’s scored a total of six goals.
Rodrigues has now scored three goals over his past six games after going his previous 15 games without one.
Tkachuk’s assist was his first point in four games.
The same can be said for Barkov’s assist, his first point in four games.
Samoskevich has picked up three assists over his past three games after logging just one helper over his previous 22 games. He did have four goals during that apple drought.
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