Panthers’ late push comes up short in Colorado and Florida has now dropped 8 of 9 on road
The Florida Panthers almost did their “Comeback Cats” act again to rally in the third period against the Colorado Avalanche. They almost played the type of road game they had been searching for and it almost let them get their best road win of this still-young season. They even almost forced overtime in the final seconds, peppering Darcy Kuemper with a barrage of shots in the last minute or two with a chance to stage another third-period comeback.
Instead, the Panthers are heading back to Florida with another road loss, a 3-2 defeat Sunday at the hands of the Avalanche in Colorado despite one of its best road performances of the season.
“I thought we competed all night, did what we set out to do, played a pretty good road game and fell a little short,” interim coach Andrew Brunette said. “A couple bounces here and there, and it’s a different game.”
The Panthers (18-5-4) outshot the Avalanche, 31-26, and finished with a 17-10 edge in high-danger chances. Playing in front of 16,548 at always-hostile Ball Arena, Florida kept the game scoreless through nearly two periods before Colorado finally scored on a power play with 22.5 seconds left in the second. Goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky was mostly fantastic, making 23 saves on 26 shots, only to be outdueled by Kuemper, who made 29 on 31, including four in the final two and a half minutes.
The Panthers, who were playing without first-line forwards Aleksander Barkov and Anthony Duclair, are still one of only four teams with 40 points and still have the best points percentage in the league, but they’ve now lost 8 of 9 away from Sunrise and missed a chance at a signature road win when they wasted a two-goal, third-period comeback in Denver.
“It was a good job by us to tie it up and then we came close in the end,” forward Sam Bennett said, “but couldn’t capitalize.”
After Colorado (16-7-2) scored with 17:57 left to go up 2-0, Florida started to press and got a power play with 11:59 remaining. Forward Joe Thornton scored a power-play goal with 12:19 left to cut the Avalanche’s lead to 2-1 and the Panthers kept the pressure on. Florida got the next three shots on goal and defenseman Brandon Montour tied the game 2-2 with 7:45 remaining.
It only took 1:28 for the Avalanche to answer, though. Colorado winger Andre Burakovsky fielded a long pass and beat Bobrovsky for a hat trick, giving the Avalanche the lead for good with 7:17 remaining.
The final seven-plus minutes were “good desperation hockey,” Thornton said. The Panthers lived in Colorado’s end of the ice for the last four minutes, posting a 13-0 edge in shot attempts in the final 3:39.
Florida pulled Bobrovsky with 2:18 left for the extra skater. It couldn’t break through. The Panthers got a power play with 1:18 left and a chance to play 6-on-4 for the final stretch of the game. They still couldn’t break through.
In the last minute, Colorado blocked three shots and Kuemper saved three more.
“It’s unfortunate,” Thornton said, “we just didn’t get a bounce.”
As encouraging as the final period was, Florida’s offense was just a bit out of whack all weekend. On Friday, the Panthers managed only 23 shots on goal — their second lowest total of the season — in a win against the league-worst Arizona Coyotes. On Sunday, Florida had just 60 shot attempts — its 10th fewest of the year — and took more than 12 minutes to finally put a shot on goal in the first period.
The Avalanche, now with four straight wins, has quickly turned back into one of the best teams in the NHL, so it’s supposed to win on its home ice, even against the first-place Panthers.
Florida knows it can be better, though. It has set a higher standard all year and it hasn’t lived up to it away from FLA Live Arena, especially this weekend.
“I don’t think we were particularly sharp with the puck. I thought we managed it fine and we battled, I just didn’t think we were strong enough on the puck in the offensive zone to really sustain a lot of offense, so we didn’t have the puck as much as we’d like,” Brunette said. “The last two games I feel we’ve been not quite as resilient when we have it where we keep it. That’s a big part of our game. When we have the puck, we want to keep it. When we don’t, we want to get it back quick. I thought we got it back quick, we just didn’t keep it long enough.”
This story was originally published December 12, 2021 at 10:59 PM.
