*Photo from Bleacher Report*
Florida leads series 1-0
This game was a long one. So long they played over two games. Anthony Duclair had two assists, Matthew Tkachuk added the winner, and the Florida Panthers beat the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Thursday night in Raleigh.
The series opener didn't just go into overtime. It didn't just go into double overtime. Not even triple overtime. That's right, 4 overtimes were needed to complete this game, with the equivalent of two whole games plus almost an entire extra period being played. This was just the series opener.
It took until the dying seconds of that 4th overtime to decide the winner too. Duclair had two assists for the Panthers, while both Aleksander Barkov and Carter Verhaeghe had a goal and an assist as the Panthers won their second straight game.
Florida head coach Paul Maurice said after the game that "At the end of the day, both teams spent what they had; that's a huge cost for both teams. There were pieces of that game that both teams owned and looked exactly like they're supposed to look."
The only goal of the first period came from Seth Jarvis, who made it 1-0 Hurricanes after one period with his 5th goal of the playoffs. Barkov scored at the 15:28 mark of the second period to tie the game 1-1 for the Panthers. At the 17:43 mark of the second, Verhaeghe put the Panthers ahead 2-1 with Barkov and Duclair assisting.
On the power play 3:47 into the 3rd period, Stefan Noesen scored for the Hurricanes, tying the game 2-2 on his 4th goal of the playoffs, assisted by Jarvis and Martin Necas. Eventually, with 13 seconds left in the 4th overtime, Tkachuk scored his 6th goal of the playoffs, assisted by Sam Bennett to give the Panthers the dramatic win.
Asked about the game, Tkachuk said "That's a great team over there. What I'm seeing is two really great teams fighting it out for every inch. It's little battles that, maybe people don't realize, but they're very important and both teams are doing it all game long."
Getting the start for the Panthers was Sergei Bobrovsky, who picked up another win with a standout performance. Bobrovsky stopped 63 of the whopping 65 shots he faced across the 7 periods played, giving him a .969 save percentage.
It was Frederik Andersen who started for the Hurricanes, also facing a heavy dose of shots on goal during the game. In the loss, Andersen turned aside 57 out of the 60 shots the Panthers had, which was good for a .950 save percentage.
Carolina captain Jordan Staal said of the quadruple OT loss that "Obviously, we had a chance to win it. I thought it was a heck of a battle. It's going to be like that every game against that team. That's playoff hockey. I'm not surprised that's the way it looked out there. We'll have to regroup and take it to the next game."
Up next, the series stays in Raleigh for game two on Saturday night. The Panthers look to take a 2-0 series lead, while the Hurricanes look to force at least a game 5 and tie the series up.
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