Coyotes finally found a way to slow down Panthers. Brunette says it’s ‘not concerning’
If the Florida Panthers had it their way, they’d put 35 or 40 shots and rack up dozens of scoring chances in every game, and, for the most, part they actually have this year. They’re second in the NHL in shots per game, and second in scoring chances and fifth in high-danger chances.
It made their 3-1 win against the Arizona Coyotes on Friday in Glendale, Arizona, especially bizarre. The Coyotes, with the worst record in the league, held the Panthers to just 23 shots on goal, and actually generated more scoring chances and high-danger chances than Florida. The Panthers, the best team in the league and one of its highest scoring, won in spite of its offense.
“They put pressure on us a lot of the game,” interim coach Andrew Brunette said Friday, “and we probably weren’t as sharp as we’d like to be.”
So far, it’s just one extreme outlier, but Florida (18-4-4) knows it will face more ugly, low-shot games between now and a potential run at the Stanley Cup. The Panthers have been the most consistent team in the league, with at least 30 shots on goal in all but five games this year, and opponents are still searching for a way to slow them down. Surprisingly, Arizona was the first team to figure it out, even if it didn’t result in a win.
While the Panthers’ game Sunday against the Colorado Avalanche at 8 p.m. at Ball Arena will almost certainly take on a different sort of tenor with the postseason-mainstay Avalanche (15-7-2) also hoping to play an up-and-down style, the Coyotes set a potential blueprint to knock Florida off its game and the Panthers responded with a win anyway.
“We were fighting a bouncing puck all night and we were playing a lot on the outside,” forward Sam Bennett said Friday. “We normally do a better job getting pucks to the net, getting bodies to the net and we played a little bit of a perimeter game tonight, but, at the end of the day, we got the win and that’s the most important thing.”
All three of Florida’s goals Friday came on shots from the outside with Arizona packing in defensively to deny the Panthers their spots around the goal. The bigger challenge Florida faced, though, was what happened on the other end of the ice.
The Panthers simply didn’t possess the puck in the same way they typically do. Their 42 shot attempts, typically the best measure of possession time, were their fewest of the season and Arizona — again, the worst team in the league — actually generated more shot attempts than Florida.
The Coyotes committed to playing the style the Panthers usually do: They let their forwards play an aggressive forecheck, trying to keep Florida from even getting into the offensive zone.
On most nights, the Panthers hope they’ll be able to out-skate their opponent and beat an aggressive forecheck to generate breakaway chances and odd-man rushes. For whatever reason, they couldn’t Friday.
“Give some credit to them,” Brunette said. “They have some young forwards that can really skate and they put pressure on us.”
Florida isn’t going to let it cause too much worry, though. The Panthers, after all, were still missing star center Aleksander Barkov, who remains day-to-day, and could get winger Anthony Duclair back from a lower-body injury Tuesday and they know they’ll be better once those two top-line forwards return to the lineup.
There’s also a track record of about two dozen other games this season that show why Florida is one of the best teams in the league. Brunette said one off night isn’t enough to cause much worry.
“We took a little while to get going, but not concerning at all,” he said. “We can play better. We know that, but give some credit to them. They pushed at us a little bit tonight.”
