Game 7! Panthers rally from down 3-1 in series to take league-best Bruins the distance
Matthew Tkachuk held the puck from his game-winning, season-saving goal aloft inside the visitors’ locker room at TD Garden on Wednesday and asked his teammates to “remember this room.” “We’ll be back here for seven,” the superstar right wing said and then stuck the puck into one of the 16 circular slots — representing the 16 wins the Florida Panthers need to win a championship — on a flat replica of the Stanley Cup.
The Panthers were confident — they have been from the start — and their trash-talking, belief-inspiring winger and his teammates backed it up in Game 6 on Friday. Florida’s first-round series with the Boston Bruins is going to Game 7 after the Panthers pulled off a second straight upset and beat the Bruins, 7-5, in Sunrise.
Florida hadn’t won multiple games in a single postseason since 1996. Now, the Panthers have done it twice in a row. The series is even now at 3-3 and winner-takes-all rubber match is set for Sunday in Boston.
Tkachuk, once again, was a major reason why, and so was All-Star center Aleksander Barkov, and even forwards Zac Dalpe and Eetu Luostarinen.
Tkachuk scored and assisted on go-ahead goals in the first period, and had a game-tying goal in the third. Barkov had a first-period assist and put Florida ahead again the second with his first goal of the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs. Dalpe, who’s 33 and had just 16 NHL goals in his life before Friday, scored a game-tying goal in the third period just minutes after the Bruins took the lead for the first time and finally Luostarinen gave the Panthers the lead for good with 5:38 remaining.
After series without a single lead change in the first five games, the lead swapped hands twice in the third period of Game 6, and Luostarinen’s snipe from the left side of the ice gave it back to Florida in final minutes and sent the crowd of 18,911 at FLA Live Arena into a frenzy.
The Panthers and Bruins combined for six goals in the third period, starting with Boston winger Tyler Bertuzzi tying the game at 3-3 with 18:28 to go and then continuing with another goal at least once every four minutes until Luostarinen’s game-winner.
First, superstar right wing David Pastrnak gave the Bruins their first lead with a power-play goal with 16:07 left and then Dalpe answered just 3:28 later. Boston winger Jake DeBrusk then put Boston back ahead with a short-handed goal with 9:38 left, and Tkachuk came back in just 27 seconds to score before the power play expired and tie the game again at 5-5.
Finally, Luostarinen sent the series back to Massachusetts when he scored off an assist by Montour.
In the final minute, the Bruins came inches from tying the game, with star goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky flailing around on the ice to desperately keep the puck out of the net. Defenseman Radko Gudas stood in the way, forward Sam Reinhart cleared the puck away and into the empty net on the other end of the ice with 28 seconds left and Florida got what it wanted.
The Panthers, who trailed the Bruins by 43 points in the regular-season standings, are one win away from pulling off perhaps the biggest first-round upset in NHL history.
