RECAP: Panthers 6, Oilers 5

EDMONTON – The goals have officially cleared customs and arrived in Canada.

After being shut out in back-to-back games at Vancouver and Calgary, the Florida Panthers filled up the back of the net in an absolute roller coaster of a 6-5 win over the Edmonton Oilers at Rogers Place on Monday.

“That was a weird one tonight, but I’m fine with it,” head coach Paul Maurice said. “We had some things we wanted to try and accomplish, and I think we did that.”

Improving to 19-11-2, the Panthers now sit at 2-2-0 on their five-game road trip.

An emotional win, tonight’s battle also marked the first meeting between the Panthers and Oilers since Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final in June.

“They’re a good team,” forward Sam Reinhart said. “You could see tonight how both teams made it far [in the playoffs]. They’ve got so much speed, so much high-end talent. They’re going to put some pucks in the net. I thought, for the most part, we defended well, and we did what we needed to do to win.”

With the Oilers on the power play, Jesper Boqvist poked the puck free at the blue line, flew down the ice on a breakaway and beat Stuart Skinner to put the Panthers up 1-0 at 2:42 of the first period.

It was also the first shorthanded goal of Boqvist’s career.

“It felt good,” Boqvist smiled.

Netting his sixth goal in the last six games, Zach Hyman evened the score for the Oilers when he found some space in the slot, took a pass from Connor McDavid and ripped a shot past Sergei Bobrovsky to make it 1-1 at 15:13.

Regaining the lead for the Panthers before the first intermission, Matthew Tkachuk, who always thrives in the enemy territory of Edmonton, set up shop outside the blue paint and deflected in a shot from Carter Verhaeghe on the power play to make it 2-1 at 19:32.

Finding the back of the net again for the Oilers, Hyman beat Bobrovsky with a backhand shot on a breakaway to make it 2-2 at 6:20 of the second period. Just 43 seconds later, Connor Brown blasted home a one-timer from the left circle to give Edmonton a 3-2 lead at 7:03.

On the power play, Leon Draisaitl made it 4-2 with his signature one-timer at 9:24.

Getting the Panthers back to within striking distance, Gustav Forsling fired a long shot that bounced off Skinner, fluttered off a defender and then floated into the cage to make it 4-3 at 17:55.

Building off that momentum at the end of the second period, the Panthers found another goal in the third period when Niko Mikkola took a pass from Anton Lundell on a 2-on-1 and roofed a shot into the twine to make it 4-4 at 6:53.

In eight career games against the Oilers, Mikkola has scored three goals.

“He’s got a ton of chances lately,” forward Carter Verhaeghe said. “He made a nice shot. It’s always nice seeing the big man score going down the back side there. He made an awesome shot. He looked like a goal scorer there.”

Jumpstarting that sequence of events was a big hit from Jonah Gadjovich on Jeff Skinner.

Less than a minute later, the Panthers briefly took the lead when Reinhart chased down a loose puck and then fired a wicked shot off Skinner’s mask and into the cage from well behind the goal line to make it 5-4 at 7:23 with his team-leading 20^th goal of the season.

"In tight, that’s probably the only way I’m putting it in there,” Reinhart said.

But just 39 seconds later, Kasperi Kapanen responded for Edmonton to make it 5-5 at 8:02.

Late in a tie game, who else do you call but Mr. Clutch?

Doing his usual thing with the game on the line, Verhaeghe collected a pass from Sam Bennett and rifled a shot past Skinner from the slot to put Florida up 6-5 at 13:05.

“Benny made a good play,” Verhaeghe said. “I just tried to shoot it as quick as I could.”

Shutting things down from there, the Panthers got one last big stop from Bobrovsky as the two-time Vezina Trophy winner denied Draisaitl with a lunging right-pad save with roughly 25 seconds left on the clock to keep the two points in the bag.

A tight win, the game featured just 8:31 of playing time where a team held a multi-goal lead.

Even without captain Aleksander Barkov (illness), the Comeback Cats found a way.

“I’m really happy with that one,” Maurice said. “I’m really proud that we were able to stay with it, dig in. In a game like that, Sasha Barkov is a really big missing piece. Everyone has to play without their best players, I get that, but there’s certain games that are tough without Barkov. We had a couple other sick guys that played big minutes tonight and played great.”

THEY SAID IT

“It was dangerous in front of both nets all night long,” – Paul Maurice

“Letting in five [goals] is not what we wanted to do, but we’ll take those two points.” – Jesper Boqvist

“There was a lot of back-and-forth there. We obviously don’t like giving up five goals. There’s some stuff to clean up, especially off the rush. But getting six [goals] and winning the game is nice.” – Carter Verhaeghe

CATS STATS

- The Panthers lead the NHL with eight shorthanded goals.

- Niko Mikkola has already matched his career-high goal total (3).

- Tomas Nosek won 71.4% of his faceoffs.

- Sam Bennett blocked a team-high three shots.

- Sergei Bobrovsky made seven high-danger saves, per NaturalStatTrick.com.

- The Panthers led 10-2 in shot attempts at 5-on-5 when A.J. Greer was deployed.

WHAT’S NEXT?

With a chance to end their road trip on a high note, the Panthers will close out their five-game trek with a matchup against the Minnesota Wild at Xcel Energy Center on Wednesday at 9:30 p.m. ET.

To find a place to watch the game in South Florida, visit FloridaPanthers.com/CatsOnTap.