*Photo from NHL.com*
Eventually, even the undefeated teams are going to lose at some point. Carter Verhaeghe scored twice, Rudolfs Balcers scored, and the Florida Panthers defeated the Philadelphia Flyers with a 4-3 victory on Wednesday night in Sunrise.
Taking the ice for their home opener, the Panthers picked up their 3rd win in 4 games to start the season, and ending the Flyers perfect 3-0-0 record in the process. Both teams now sit at 3-1-0 early in the season. Verhaeghe shined with two goals, also scoring twice in the Panthers home opener last year.
Verhaeghe said of his two goal home opener that "Hopefully I will keep this trend going. We're not playing as run-and-gun as in years past, we're playing better defensively and that takes from our offense, but I think that's worth it. Going into hard games going down the stretch, it's going to be worth it."
Starting the scoring in the first period was Verhaeghe, who gave the Panthers a 1-0 lead 6:06 into the game on his first goal of the season. Verhaeghe quickly added his second 8:38 into the game, making it 2-0 with assists from Aleksander Barkov and Gustav Forsling. Nick Seeler got the Flyers on the board at the 16:31 mark of the first, making it a 2-1 game after one period.
The only goal of the second period was a James van Riemsdyk power play goal, tying the game at a 2-2 score. In the 3rd, Balcers scored 3:51 into the period to give the Panthers a 3-2 lead. That was followed by the eventual game winning goal from Josh Mahura, making it 4-2. Travis Konecny scored with 3 seconds left to make it a 4-3 game, but the Panthers held on from there.
Mahura said of his 3rd period goal that "Obviously it is exciting to get the win here in the home opener. I did exactly what I wanted to do. It's exciting for our team. It was awesome, we had a lot of energy out there, and I thought we played a pretty good 60-minute game."
Starting in net for the Panthers was Sergei Bobrovsky, who got the win to improve to 2-1-0 this season. Bobrovsky turned aside 31 of the 34 shots he faced, picking up a .911 save percentage in the win.
Felix Sandstrom was in net for the Flyers, making his season debut. Sandstrom was stuck with the loss, saving 33 of 37 shots from the Panthers. That was good for a .891 save percentage to fall to 0-1-1 on the season.
Flyers head coach John Tortorella said of the game that "I thought we were slow coming out. I thought as the game went on, we played better, found a way to crawl back into it. To give up the third goal and just a simple 2-on-2, that's the one that hurts. I thought Sandstrom gave us a chance. But to give up a 2-on-2, that's a free one, even-strength, strange situation. That's the one that hurts to me."
Up next, the Panthers play host to the in-state rival Tampa Bay Lightning on Friday night, with Bobrovsky likely to start. The Flyers hit the road for a Saturday matchup against the Nashville Predators, with Carter Hart likely to get the start.
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