Florida Panthers crushed by Dallas Stars, hit halfway mark of season 18-19-4
The Florida Panthers’ game on Sunday to end the first half of their 2022-23 season in a sense was a microcosm of their 41-game stretch to this point.
So many problems the Panthers have faced this season — shaky goaltending, special teams struggles and an inability to convert chances into goals — compounded in Florida’s 5-1 loss to the Dallas Stars at American Airlines Center. The Panthers fall to 18-19-4 at the halfway mark of the season — the first time Florida has a sub-.500 points percentage midway through a season since 2017-2018 when they were 17-18-6 at the midway point of the campaign.
They face a massive uphill climb over the final 41 games if they want any chance to claim a spot in the Stanley Cup Playoff.
“It sucks losing,” forward Carter Verhaeghe told reporters in Dallas after the game. “It’s just not where we want to be.”
And it’s because of games like Sunday that the Panthers are in this position.
The Panthers, who have yet to win three consecutive games at any point this season, dominated early on Sunday but couldn’t turn that into goals.
Florida outshot Dallas 15-8 and had a 13-6 edge in scoring chances (including 8-4 in high-danger chances) in the first period but trailed 1-0 after 20 minutes. The Stars’ Jason Robertson scored his first of two goals in the game with 3:15 left in the opening period when he collected his own rebound and scored on Spencer Knight with his second effort.
“It’s easy to say put the puck in the net, but obviously they’re not going in for us right now,” Panthers star center and captain Aleksander Barkov said. “We have a lot of chances. We grind them down in the offensive zone. We do a lot of good things there, but pucks are not going in.”
The Panthers never recovered from there.
Dallas (24-11-6) went up 2-0 midway through the second period while Nils Lundkvist scored on a one-timer in the final seconds of a Stars power-play.
Verhaeghe, who led the Panthers with six shots on goal, broke up Florida’s shutout with a short-side goal two-and-a-half minutes later to cut the Panthers’ deficit to 2-1. It was Verhaeghe’s 19th goal of the season.
Dallas responded 39 seconds later with a goal from Esa Lindell to go back up two goals before Robertson buried his second goal of the night on a breakaway 4:21 into the third period. Miro Heiskanen’s empty-net goal with 4:11 left to play capped scoring.
Knight gave up four goals on 33 shots against. Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger stopped 27 of Florida’s 28 shots on goal.
“We really liked our game [when it was] 2-1. When they made it 3-1, I really didn’t like our game after that,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. “We absolutely stopped skating and that was the driver for us early through the 3-1 goal and then after that, we tried to do it a different, easier — I’m not sure what we were trying to do, but we stopped moving our feet and you can’t play the game if you’re not skating.”
Just how big was the difference in production?
After Verhaeghe’s goal, Florida logged just six shots on goal in the final 27:25 of game action, including just three total shots on goal in the third period.
This was despite the fact the Panthers had two power-plays in the third period, both of which came up empty. Florida went 0 for 4 overall with a man-advantage on Sunday and are scoring on just 20.3 percent of their power-play opportunities this season.
Last season, Florida had one of the best power play units in the league, with a 24.4 percent success rate that was the fifth-best in the NHL.
The other end of their special teams hasn’t been great, either.
The Panthers have allowed 39 goals while on the penalty kill through 41 games this season. In the entirety of the 2021-22 season, Florida allowed just 53 total goals when the opponent was on the power play — only 14 more than the Panthers have allowed halfway through this season.
“Didn’t like our power play,” Maurice said. “I liked half my five-on-five game and the other half, I hated, so I’ve gotta get rid of the part that I hate.”
Up next
The Panthers continue their four-game road trip against the Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday and conclude the trip Thursday against the Vegas Golden Knights.
After that, Florida returns home for one game — Saturday against Vancouver — before another three-game road trip.
This story was originally published January 8, 2023 at 6:07 PM.
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