The Florida Panthers avoided elimination in the Stanley Cup Qualifiers by defeating the New York Islanders 3-2 in Game 3 of their best-of-5 series at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Wednesday.
"We played hard in a do-or-die situation," Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad said. "We asked a lot of each other today and we came out with a Grade A outcome. We're happy and excited to do it all again in two days."
Sergei Bobrovsky made 20 saves one day after allowing four goals on 34 shots in a 4-2 loss in Game 2. The Panthers, the No. 10 seed in the Eastern Conference, scored twice on the power play, and their fourth line scored a 5-on-5 goal.
Game 4 is in Toronto, the Eastern Conference hub city, on Friday (Noon ET; NBCSN, NHL.TV, SN, TVAS, FS-F, MSG+). The series winner advances to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
"It's a little bit of a missed opportunity for us to knock them out, but they're a good hockey team," New York coach Barry Trotz said. "They're a very talented team and well-coached, and they've got some star power. We got away a little bit from our game, but we know we have to get back to our game."
Teams with a 2-0 lead are 56-1 (98.2 percent) winning a best-of-5 NHL series (39-1 when last used from 1980-86). The Islanders defeated the Washington Capitals in a 1985 series.
Panthers forward Jonathan Huberdeau didn't finish the game, missing the final 5:02 after sustaining what appeared to be an injury in the third period.
"We'll see how he presents," Florida coach Joel Quenneville said. "He was battling through some things there. We'll see how he is. I think we're hopeful he'll be fine."
Erik Haula and Mike Hoffman each scored a power-play goal, and Brian Boyle scored Florida's 5-on-5 goal. The Panther were 2-for-5 with 10 shots on goal on the power play and 3-for-3 without allowing a shot on goal in 4:44 on the penalty kill after being outscored 3-1 in special teams in the first two games.
"Playoff hockey, you've got to take on a tone of a defensive type of mindset and a commitment to play without the puck," Quenneville said. "Simplicity sometimes puts you in the right fashion. Trying to manufacture all the time usually leads to trouble against you."
The Panthers said they were particularly impressed with Haula's block on Ryan Pulock's one-timer at 13:53 of the second period. He stepped in front of the shot and was knocked down by it; he hobbled to the bench and Ekblad, who had just come out of the penalty box, gave him a hug.
"So much respect for that," Ekblad said. "It was awesome to see. Obviously, I took the penalty, so for him to do that, I was just giving him a hug and telling him, 'I've got a big block for you coming up at some point in this series.' It was a gutsy play by him."
Nearly 10 minutes before the block, Haula gave the Panthers a 1-0 lead, scoring from the bottom of the left face-off circle off a cross-slot pass from Evgenii Dadonov at 4:02, 1:09 after the Islanders were called for too many men on the ice.
Trotz called the penalty "inexcusable."
"Usually changes, everybody knows who's up," Trotz said, "and you watch your guy coming to the bench, and one of our players was obviously not watching, and he jumped on. That's not being real sharp."
New York tied it 1-1 on Pageau's goal off a one-timer from the right circle at 16:26 of the second.
Florida scored twice in the first 2:48 of the third period.
Hoffman made it 2-1 at 41 seconds, scoring on a one-timer from the right circle off a pass from Keith Yandle. The Panthers were on the power play because Varlamov played the puck outside the trapezoid.
"I made a mistake on that play," Varlamov said. "Very simple, I should handle the puck better. It cost us a goal."
The Panthers kept pressuring, and Boyle scored to make it 3-1 at 2:48.
"It's rewarding for us because we're putting the work in," Boyle said. "A few mistakes have cost us so far, and we're not where we want to be in the series, but we can only control today, and up to the third period, we could only control how we started that third period. We did a good job."
Nelson scored a 6-on-5 goal with Varlamov on the bench for the extra skater at 18:33 to make it 3-2.
Bobrovsky made three more saves in the final 1:27 to preserve the win.
"It's great for our team, for our guys, for us to step up in today's game," Bobrovsky said. "It was a big game. A big game mentally and I thought every guy in the locker room elevated his game."
NHL.com independent correspondent Sean Farrell contributed to this report
