The Carolina Hurricanes suffered their first loss of the pre-season Saturday night, falling 5-4 to the Florida Panthers at Amerant Bank Arena.
It’ll certainly be a learning experience for the mostly prospect-based group that went down to Florida as the Canes ended up surrendering what was at one point a 4-1 lead.
Some struggles with in-zone defending, clearing pucks and turnovers gave the Panthers the opportunity to crawl back into the game and in the NHL, you can’t give your opponent anything.
Overall though, it was a good performance by the Canes ‘B’ group.
Carolina outshot Florida 31-29 and had a perfect 4-for-4 penalty kill, including 1:55 of kill time to start overtime.
The young squad also started hot and showed a much more concentrated effort than their first pre-season game in Tampa.
Jackson Blake got the game going early with a nasty toe-drag and snipe just 2:22 into the game.
It was a really strong game for Blake, who demonstrated his high-end stickhandling and offensive senses throughout the night.
He’s been the most noticeable prospect this pre-season and he’s certainly making a case for himself.
As the first period was coming to a close, Juha Jaaska created a breakaway for himself by stripping the puck off of a Panther in the neutral zone and then finished off with a top-corner snipe.
Jaaska takes advantage of a young Gracyn Sawchyn trying to do too much in neutral ice and cashes in from there.
A good moment for the 26-year-old trying to make an impression. pic.twitter.com/VFjmahsyps
— Walt Ruff (@WaltRuff) September 28, 2024
In the second period, Jack Drury added to the Canes’ lead by hammering a loose puck off of a Chris Driedger poke check and then 24 seconds later, Gleb Trikozov found himself the recipient of a Bradly Nadeau feed as he was alone in front and he doesn’t miss from there.
The Panthers had some real trouble in their own end and left Trikozov unmarked in front on top of that.
That’s a bad combo, but a good outcome for the visitors. pic.twitter.com/2hxcFoUvTK
— Walt Ruff (@WaltRuff) September 28, 2024
However, the Panthers never went away and as they kept pushing and pressuring the Canes, they eventually started to whittle down the Hurricanes’ lead until it was once again tied heading into the third period.
Nothing was decided there so overtime was the next step and that’s where the Panthers would ultimately finish the comeback as Jesper Boqvist cleaned up a rebound in front of Spencer Martin for the win.
Misc. Notes
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Jack Drury continues to…