Florida Panthers get pounded by the Philadelphia Flyers 5-1

The Florida Panthers were heading into this game with a record of 2-3-0. With some good play occurring during the last few games, surely the Cats were able to take this one, right?

The Panthers came storming with bursts of energy and pressure during the opening minutes of the first. The first line of Huberdeau, Barkov and Vrbata were applying dangerous pressure down deep in the Flyers zone. However, would their strong play result in a goal?

Not quite. With lots of possession retained in the Flyers zone and movement happening, the Cats just couldn’t buy themselves a goal. The Broad Street Bullies stuck to their guns and closed out the first, with a score line of zero apiece.

The game all came crashing down on the Panthers’ heads when Sean Couturier opened up the scoring with a minute into the second period. After a loose puck was sitting in Luongo’s crease, Couturier whacked at it a couple of times, eventually slotting one home for his side.

Around six and a half minutes later, defenseman Shayne Gotishbehere sniped a shot over Luongo’s blocker to give the Flyers a 2-0 lead. Things were starting to go from bad to worse, very quickly for our Panthers.

With seven and a half minutes left in the period, Claude Giroux received a stretch pass from Valtteri Filppula, finding himself one on one with Luongo. Needless to say, Claude buried his chance five-hole on Lu. 3-0 Flyers:

The second period truly couldn’t have gotten any worse as Dale Weise extended his sides lead to four goals. After Konecny was stoned by Luongo, Nolan Patrick sent a pass between his legs to Dale Weise, and the rest was history:

Even as the game was out of reach, rookie Owen Tippett didn’t fail to impress the crowd on his rookie debut:

As fruitful as Tippett was playing tonight, he ended the game with seven SOG (Shots on Goal), the most from any player on the ice tonight. Owen looked poised and calm when the puck was on his stick, which isn’t usual for an 18-year-old playing in his first NHL game.

With the start of a fresh period (down by four goals), finally, just finally, Jamie McGinn put the Panthers on the board. After receiving a beautiful cross-crease pass from Bjugstad, McGinn was left to poke home the only goal scored from FLA tonight:

Shortly after the McGinn goal, Nick Bjugstad took the draw just outside the Flyers blue line, to find himself scoring on his own net after the puck was dropped:

The game ended in favor of the Flyers (5-1) and rightfully so. Lack of coverage and costly turnovers were the deciding factors for this game. Your Florida Panthers will look to bounce back on Friday, October 20th against the Pittsburgh Penguins. This will be the second time this season where the two will square off.