Panthers race by Penguins 5-2 to extend franchise-record road winning streak to 9
Anton Lundell scored twice, Matthew Tkachuk added a goal and two assists and the surging Florida Panthers cruised past the Pittsburgh Penguins 5-2 on Wednesday night.
Aaron Ekblad and Johan Gadjovich also scored and Evan Rodrigues added two assists to reach 200 career points as the Panthers extended their franchise-record road winning streak to nine. Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 25 shots to win his fifth consecutive start.
Jake Guentzel scored his 23rd goal of the season for Pittsburgh. John Ludvig scored the first goal of his career in the third but the game was effectively decided during a 9:26 span in the second in which Florida beat Tristan Jarry four times. Jarry finished with 18 saves but couldn’t stop the Penguins from dropping their third straight.
The Penguins had opportunities early but had a goal overturned on replay due to a high stick and wasted three power plays, giving the Panthers enough time to find their footing.
Florida improved to 163-2 since Dec. 23, a stretch in which the Panthers have zoomed up the Atlantic Division standings to draw within striking distance of first-place Boston.
Tkachuk has been right in the middle of it. The twotime All-Star has 32 points — including 13 goals and 19 assists — over Florida’s last 17 games. The forward broke open a sleepy game 4:28 into the second period when he finished off a 3-on-2 break by tapping in a pass from Rodrigues into an open net to put the Panthers in front.
Gadjovich doubled Florida’s lead just 34 seconds later, redirecting Brandon Montour’s shot from the point by Jarry to make it 2-0.
The Panthers kept on coming. Ekblad’s low wrist shot on the power play 8:27 into the second pushed the advantage to three and when Tkachuk fed a wide-open Lundell at the side of the Pittsburgh net less than four minutes later, Florida was in cruise control while the restless PPG Paints Arena crowd booed.
JETS 1, SHARKS 0 >> Connor Hellebuyck stops 17 shots for his third shutout of the season as the Winnipeg Jets beat the San Jose Sharks 1-0 on Wednesday night.
Morgan Barron scored as the Jets won their second straight after a season-high five-game skid. Hellebuyck got his 35th career shutout and became the 10th goalie in NHL history to allow three goals or fewer for the 30 consecutive games in the regular season.
Kaapo Kahkonen stopped 39 shots for the Sharks, who were playing for the first time since Jan. 31 and fell to 4-2-2 in their last eight games.
The Sharks had four shots over the first 4:35 of the game while the Jets had none. Winnipeg then rattled off 15 straight shots on goal, with Barron scoring on the 13th with 2:37 remaining in the opening period. Neal Pionk’s shot was tipped by Adam Lowry and then deflected off Barron for his career-high ninth.
Winnipeg added two more shots to finish the period with a 15-4 advantage.
The Jets got one more shot early in the second period before San Jose recorded its fifth one at 1:30, going a span of 16:55 without a shot on goal.
Jets forward Nino Niederreiter had four good chances to score in the second but was denied by Kahkonen.
Sharks forward Anthony Duclair looked like he might have scored late in the period, but the play was reviewed and it was confirmed the puck didn’t cross the line before it hit Mark Scheifele, who got behind Hellebuyck in the net to help out the goalie.