Five Takeaways from Panthers Game 4 loss to Bruins

SUNRISE – Playoff hockey came early today in Sunrise, with the Panthers and Bruins facing off in an afternoon Game 4.

 

The Bruins had their way for a second straight game at FLA Live Arena in a 6-2 win, taking both of their road games.

 

Boston now leads the series 3-1, with a chance to close it out Wednesday night at home.

 

Takeaways:

Bruins Power Play was dangerous

Boston’s power play this series has been more than a step ahead of the Panthers. 

 

The opening minutes of the game was flat out dominated by Florida – with the shots at one point being 10-0 in favor of the home team. 

 

At 9:11 into the first, Colin White called for interference, putting the Bruins on the man-advantage. 

 

Boston got some juice being a man up and eventually opened the scoring. 

 

After two huge saves by Sergei Bobrovsky, Brad Marchand poked in a loose puck, putting the Bruins up 1-0.

 

The Bruins started the second period on the power play after Matthew Tkachuk got called for cross-checking Garnet Hathaway behind the net following the conclusion of the period.

 

With just eight seconds remaining on the Tkachuk penalty, a great zone entry by the Bruins led to Jake DeBrusk’s second goal of the series. 

 

Paul Maurice made multiple lineup changes in Game 4

Panthers head coach Paul Mauric kept everyone out of the loop pre-game when he had his media availability. 

 

We didn’t know who would be the starting goalie, who would be in the lineup and who would be out. 

The most we got was that either Bobrovsky or Alex Lyon would be in net… obviously.

 

When the teams came out for warmups, Aaron Ekblad was not on the ice. The Panthers’ defenseman was injured in Game 3. Despite skating yesterday in Florida’s optional practice, the former first-overall pick was absent for tonight’s game.

 

Casey Fitzgerald filled in for Ekblad tonight on the blueline. 

 

The bigger surprise omission from the Cats lineup tonight was Anthony Duclair. Duclair took warmups tonight and was part of the normal line rushes – so it seemed like he would definitely be in the lineup… that wasn’t the case.

 

Duclair, who is pointless in the series, was scratched tonight. He was replaced by Zac Dalpe, who spent the majority of the season in AHL Charlotte. Dalpe has been with the team all postseason, but he didn’t play in a game before tonight. 

 

And finally, Sergei Bobrovsky made his first start of the playoffs tonight. Alex Lyon got the nod in games 1-3. After a short relief appearance in game 3, Bobrovsky got his first full game of the series tonight. 

 

Taylor Hall with a big four-point game

The Bruins forward may not be the same player he was when he won the Hart Trophy a few years back with New Jersey, but he definitely played close to that level tonight. 

 

Hall finished the game with two goals and four points, while icing the game with Boston’s fifth goal off a nice move in front of Sergei Bobrovsky.

 

Hall has seven points through four games in this series, which is the most on the team this postseason.

 

Florida drops both at home 

Coming into the arena on Friday night, the Panthers were in pretty good shape. 

 

Riding off a dominating win in Boston, Florida had the chance to shift the series in their favor at home. They didn’t.

 

Now onto Sunday, Florida once again could have made this series interesting by tying it up ahead of Game 5. They didn’t.

 

The Panthers dropped both of their home games and now have to play with their season on the line in Boston against a team that only lost seven times in their building throughout the regular season. 

 

Bennett, Tkachuk, Montour and that’s about it

The three best skaters in this series, offensively at least – have been Sam Bennett, Brandon Montour and Matthew Tkachuk.

 

The offense tonight was almost all on them again. 

 

Bennett had a good showing with his power play goal, which is the first one the Panthers scored all series. 

 

Tkachuk did what he’s done all season – get points in the score sheet. He scored the first Panthers goal of the game off a between-the-legs shot to cut the Bruins lead to 2-1. He picked up a helper on the Bennett goal.

 

Montour grabbed his third point of the series and had six shots on goal, which led the Panthers blue line. 

 

The Panthers captain looked about as aggressive as he has all series, getting seven shots on net, but we are through four games of this series and he has yet to score a goal. 

 

Florida had chances around Linus Ullmark’s net, both too many loose pucks were left unfinished by the Panthers as the Bruins’ goalie turned away 41 of Florida’s 43 shots.