Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 39: Reinhart ties series for Panthers with OT winner

Tuesday night saw us continue the action in the Eastern Conference Final series between the New York Rangers and the Florida Panthers, with the Rangers up 2-1 in the series. Both teams made plenty of lineup changes going into the game, with Blake Wheeler playing his first game for the Rangers in over three months, and Steven Lorentz and Kyle Okposo stepping into the lineup in place of Ryan Lomberg and Nick Cousins.

The Rangers electric power play has been one of the reasons they’ve made it this far in the playoffs, but so far against the Panthers they’ve had no luck on the man advantage. That changed midway through the first period, as Artemi Panarin set up Vincent Trocheck in the slot, and a well-placed shot from the Rangers center gave New York the 1-0 lead with their first power play goal of the season.

But the Panthers turned things around midway through the second period. Just before the nine minute mark, Sam Bennett carried the puck into the offensive zone and put it on net, and Igor Shesterkin just couldn’t get it covered up before it got jammed into the net.

And then on the power play about three and a half minutes later, Matthew Tkachuk set up Carter Verhaeghe in front of the net, and when Shesterkin stopped the initial attempt, Verhaeghe batted the puck out of the air and in to give Florida the 2-1 lead.

The Rangers needed a response in the third period, and they managed to get one from a usual suspect in this series. Adam Fox made a couple of nifty moves to set up Alexis Lafreniere in front of the net, who buried it to tie the game. The Panthers upped the pressure in the third again in an attempt to get the go-ahead goal, but they couldn’t beat Shesterkin, and for the third straight game, we were getting overtime.

However, it didn’t take long to decide the winner. Just 59 seconds in, Wheeler hooked Aleksander Barkov to put the Panthers on the power play again, and they needed only 13 seconds with the man advantage before a great tic-tac-toe play set up Sam Reinhart in the slot to snipe the overtime winner.

With that goal, the Panthers win the game 3-2 in overtime, and tie the series at 2-2. Panarin, Fox and Barkov all led their respective teams in scoring with two assists each, and despite the loss, Shesterkin still managed to stop 37 of 40 shots in the game.