"It was not an easy night," Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. "It wasn't a smooth night by any means. It was a hard-fought game. Man, they don't quit here. They kept pushing. We lost another guy, then you've got penalties, then you've got [Aleksander] Barkov on defense on the penalty kill. It was a bit of a rally for the guys. I just loved their spirit and their fight. You're not winning them all, so if you have to go down in a game you might as well go down swinging."
Just 21 seconds after the puck dropped in the first period, Jake DeBrusk forced a turnover in the neutral zone before ripping a far-side snipe past Sergei Bobrosky to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead.
Scoring his first goal of the season to pull the Panthers even in the second period, Sam Bennett dashed toward the net and tapped in a tape-to-tape centering feed from Matthew Tkachuk to make it 1-1 at 4:32. With the assist, Tkachuk extended his season-opening point streak to three games.
Not long after Linus Ullmark flashed leather to rob Sam Reinhart, the Bruins regained the lead when DeBrusk set up Patrice Bergeron for a goal with a nifty backhand pass to make it 2-1 at 12:35. Already starting the game without Brandon Montour (upper body), the Panthers lost a second defenseman when Aaron Ekblad left the ice after Bergeron's goal and did not return.
After the game, Maurice said Ekblad's injury was lower-body and that he'd be re-evaluated on Tuesday. As for Montour, Maurice said that he doesn't expect his injury to be long term.
Moments after their power play had expired, the Bruins extended their lead when David Pastrnak, who has nine goals in 24 career games against Florida, sliced through the defense before slipping the puck under Bobrovsky's pads to make it 3-1 at 7:01 of the third period.
At 12:31, Trent Frederic cashed in on a wrap-around to push Boston's lead to 4-1. Coming up with a response for the Panthers just 27 seconds later, Gustav Forsling unloaded a cannon from just below the blue line that screamed straight past Ullmark to make it 4-2 at 12:58.
Refusing to pack it in, Maurice said he loved the fight he saw from players.
"It's an 82-game race here, but they're on the path," Maurice said when asked about his team's early growth this season. "I like the way they think the game. I like the way they treat each other on the bench. I like how wired they are for the game. They like playing. They're excited. In a game like tonight when it wasn't easy, there was no complaining. They just kept battling."
Pulling their goaltender in favor of the extra attacker, the Panthers briefly trimmed their deficit to 4-3 when Colin White fought through traffic and tapped in a rebound with 1:37 seconds left in regulation. But with 1:03 left on the clock, the Bruins regained their two-goal lead when DeBrusk cashed in on a long empty-netter to make it 5-3.
Bobrovsky finished with 29 saves, while Ullmark turned aside 36 shots.
"We did a great job fighting until the end there," White said. "It's unfortunate when guys go out, especially when you start the game short on the back end anyway. We fought hard until the end and now we get to go back home."
