Florida needed just 95 seconds into the second period to take a 3-2 lead on Smith’s rebound goal.
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Playing in just his third National Hockey League game, Quine provided a huge play in the game in the third period, powering through the zone and past three defenders with an incredible move to the net, getting off a shot that bounced off Luongo and to Ryan Strome, who scored the winning goal.
The New York Islanders and Florida Panthers will be back in action Friday night at 7:30 p.m. Eastern for Game 2 of the Eastern Conference first round playoff series. “We’ve got to clean some stuff up”.
Thomas Greiss kept the Islanders in it long enough for John Tavares to get the Islanders to win Game 1. Jagr led the Panthers with 66 points this season, while Aleksander Barkov had a team-best 28 goals and Jussi Jokinen paced the club with 42 assists.
According to oddsmakers from online sports book Bovada.lv, the Panthers are -145 money line favorites versus the Islanders, who have odds of +125 to pull off the upset tonight at Game 1.
Past year a promising NY squad downed in the first round to Washington, but there was one thing about the series: Travis Hamonic.
“The host Florida Panthers” first playoff game in four years might have gone to the home team if not for the first pick in the 2009 draft. Just this past football season, it seemed as though Peyton Manning was going through a season-long victory lap around the NFL.Even this early in baseball season, the standing ovations for David Ortiz have already begun.So it might seem like 43 year old Jaromir Jagr is on a farewell tour with the Florida Panthers right now.
“I felt it hit me”, Greiss said, “but I had no clue where it went afterwards, but our own guy was first to the puck and…”
The Panthers will play the New York Islanders in the first round.
For the Islanders against Florida, defenseman Marek Zidlicky (0-3-3) was the leading scorer in the season series. Veteran Roberto Luongo took the loss and now has a career playoff record of 32-32.
Just 1:31 into the second period, the second-line trio clicked again as Nick Bjugstad won the draw, got it to Jokinen, who passed back to defenseman Alex Petrovic. The third period, however, tilted in New York’s favor, and Greiss made some key saves in the final minutes. Florida went 8-4-2 in the second of back-to-back games during the regular season, but the Islanders were 9-3-3. A win over Philadelphia would have given NY a matchup with the Pittsburgh Penguins, red hot heading into the postseason with wins in 14 of 15 games before dropping their finale.
In three regular season meetings the Islanders were 1-1-1 against the Panthers. These teams will also be meeting in the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time ever.
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That considerable hump will have to be navigated without Jaroslav Halak, the team’s No. 1 goalie for the majority of the season, giving Thomas Greiss the opportunity to backstop NY past Florida and into the second round against the victor of the Tampa Bay-Detroit series.
