5 TAKEAWAYS: Montour's OT winner lifts Panthers to 13th straight win

SUNRISE, Fla. - The record books continue to be rewritten.
Setting a new franchise record with their 13th straight win, Brandon Montour scored 2:26 into overtime to lift the Panthers to a 3-2 win over the Maple Leafs at FLA Live Arena on Saturday.
Not done there, the Panthers also set an NHL record with their 13th overtime win of the season.

"It's been incredible," Montour smiled. "The guys we have in the locker room are all great people. … We come to the rink and have fun. We've got a heck of hockey club in there."
With the Atlantic Division and top seed in the Eastern Conference already locked up, the Panthers (57-15-6) also now lead the Avalanche by four points for the Presidents' Trophy.
"It doesn't matter who we play," said Panthers forward Claude Giroux, who tallied a team-high three points (one goal, two assists) against Toronto. "We want to keep getting better as a team and keep building on what we're doing right now."
Finding the back of the net on their first shot of the game, the Maple Leafs jumped out to a 1-0 lead when Mitch Marner blasted a shot past Sergei Bobrovsky just 3:25 into the opening period.
Later in the period, Justin Holl doubled the lead for Toronto when his centering pass in transition took a lucky bounce off of a defender in front before sailing into the cage to make it 2-0 at 17:20.
In the second period, Mason Marchment sliced through Toronto's defense before having Jack Campbell come out and poke the puck away from him. In perfect position to pounce, Aleksander Barkov then jumped on the puck and wired it home to trim Florida's deficit down to 2-1 at 6:26.
Pulling the Panthers even on the power play, Giroux settled down a slick pass from Jonathan Huberdeau before locking, loading and unleashing a heavy shot from beyond the right circle that flew through traffic and past Campbell to make it 2-2 with 5:06 remaining in the middle frame.
From that point on, a goalie battle ensued.
Over the course of the second and third periods, Campbell stopped 20 of 22 shots, while Bobrovsky turned aside all 25 shots that he faced to leave the door open for the Panthers.
Kicking that door down in overtime, Montour flew down the center of the ice and poked a pinpoint pass from Marchment into the net to cap off the 3-2 win and keep the streak alive.
"Bob was great," Brunette said. "He's the reason we got where we were. We pushed back a bit in the second and got ourselves back in the game, but Bob kept us in it. Their goalie was really good, too. It was a good hockey game. Two good teams, and it took overtime to decided it."
Here are five takeaways Saturday's win in Sunrise…

1. THIS IS (ALMOST) FORTY

The captain is on the verge of joining some elite company.
By burying his team-leading 39th goal in the second period, Barkov now just needs one more score to join Pavel Bure as the only two Panthers to ever record 40 goals in a single season.
Bringing back-to-back Maurice "Rocket" Richard Trophies to South Florida, Bure followed up a 58-goal campaign in 1999-00 by lighting the lamp a franchise-record 59 times in 2000-01.

Despite missing 13 games earlier this season due to an unfortunate injury, Barkov has still managed to put up his usual eye-popping numbers. Second on the team in scoring with 88 points (38 goals, 49 assists), he's tallied 11 goals and 13 assists over his last 13 contests.
In that 13-game stretch, he's posted nine multi-point performances.

2. CATS LOVE CLAUDE

Nothing like a PP(G) to shift momentum.
Moments after he won a key draw in the offensive zone, Giroux took a pass from Huberdeau and blasted a long shot past Campbell on the power play to make it 2-2 in the second period.
Heating up, Florida has scored at least one power-play goal in eight of its last 12 games.

"In the playoffs the power play is a huge factor," Giroux said. "For us, we have a lot of players that want to make plays. We're just trying to get more pucks to the net and things are going to open up after that."
Finishing with a goal and two assists against the Maple Leafs, Giroux earned the 245th multi-point game of his career, which are the seventh-most by any player since his debut in 2007-08.
Producing at better than a point-per-game pace since coming over from the Flyers at the trade deadline last month, Giroux, who has compiled 52 points (21 goals, 41 assists) this season, has registered a whopping 20 points (three goals, 17 assists) in just 16 games since being acquired.

3. MONTY MANIA

You never forget your first.
Scoring the first overtime goal of him career, Montour made sure the Panthers would keep on streaking when he flew down the slot and poked the puck past Campbell to lock in the 3-2 win.

"It's nice to chip in offensively," Montour said of his timely tally. "That's one of my strengths, to jump up in the play and create offense. It's nice to get that one."
Setting a new career-high with his 10th goal of the season, Montour, who has been providing the Panthers with a steady stream of offense from the blue line all season long, has also already set career-best marks in assists (26) and points (36) during his first full campaign in South Florida.
"We're so close to the end, to the playoffs, that we're going to get every team's best," Montour said. "We want to be at our best. Playoffs is a whole new ballgame. It doesn't matter what happened in the season, we want to bring it every night."

4. BOB THE BRICK WALL

There was a long stretch during tonight's game where Bobrovsky looked unbeatable.
By turning aside 34 of 36 shots - including all 27 he faced after the first period - against the Maple Leafs, the two-time Vezina Trophy increased his NHL-leading wins total to 39.
"We have no business winning that game if Bob doesn't make the saves he made," Giroux said. "He was solid. In the third, he really shut the door for us."
Of his saves, 16 were on shots from high-danger areas, per NaturalStatTrick.com.
"He's so steady," Montour said. "He's so calm back there. Whether he lets a goal in or makes a big save, it's right on to the next one. He's obviously been a backbone for our squad all year."
Over his last 15 appearances, Bobrovsky owns a perfect 13-0-0 record.

5. WINDING DOWN AT HOME

You only have one more chance to catch the Panthers at home before the playoffs.
Wrapping up their regular-season slate of games at FLA Live Arena, they'll take a quick breather before getting right back on the ice host the intrastate rival Lightning on Sunday.
On a franchise-record run at home, they've won each of their last 11 games in Sunrise.
"These games are going to be really hard down the stretch here," Brunette said. "It's kind of good to get tonight, and then tomorrow will be another hard one, and then Tuesday [at Boston] will be another hard one. I think that'll be good for our group. We have to clean up a few things."
Owning a 34-6-0 record at home, the Panthers trail only the Red Wings (36 in 1995-96) and the Flyers (36 in 1975-76) for the most wins at home in a single season in the history of the NHL.
"It's great," Giroux said. "We go into games with a lot of confidence. I feel after each win we say to each other that we know we can play better. Everything's going great right now. We're getting some bounces, guys are making plays and we're having fun. We've just got to keep going."