Sam Bennett and Sam Reinhart had their first opportunities denied but ultimately got rewarded down the stretch.
In the second period against the Anaheim Ducks on Sunday, with the Florida Panthers trying to pad a lead and cap a lackluster road trip on a high note, both Bennett and Reinhart put shots on a nearly wide-open net only to be denied by goaltender John Gibson.
The duo, which has had its share of offensive bad luck early in the season, finally broke through in the third period with three goals to lead the Panthers to a 5-3 win over the Ducks at the Honda Center to improve to 7-5-1 on the season and go 2-2-0 on this West Coast trip.
Florida opened the trip with a 3-1 loss to the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday, beat the San Jose Sharks 4-3 in a shootout (with Reinhart getting the winner) on Thursday and lost 5-4 to the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday before winning against the Ducks (4-8-1).
According to the advanced statistics website Natural Stat Trick, Reinhart and Bennett entered Sunday among the top 40 in the NHL in expected goals created — Bennett 32nd at 5.0, Reinhart 39th at 4.81.
In reality? Bennett had one goal. Reinhart had yet to get a puck in the back of the net. Every other player in the top 40 had scored at least two goals, with 26 having scored at least five goals.
Their fortunes changed in the third period.
Reinhart, who celebrated his 27th birthday on Sunday, put Florida up 3-2 about three minutes into the third period when he picked up a loose puck in front of the net and jammed it past Gibson. Reinhart let out a yell of celebration behind the net after scoring.
Bennett gave the Panthers an insurance goal about five minutes later when he took a cross-ice feed from Eetu Luostarinen and fired it into the net to give the Panthers a 4-2 edge with 11:50 left to play.
Reinhart added an empty-net goal right as time expired in the third period.
It was a needed jolt after the Panthers watched an early lead disappear.
Carter Verhaeghe scored his team-leading eighth goal in the first period when he deflected a Brandon Montour shot from the point with the bottom of his stick on the power play. Montour then scored on a shot from the point early in the second to put Florida up 2-0.
But the Ducks scored twice against Spencer Knight in a span of 27 midway through the second period to level the game.
Knight settled in from there while the offense regained the lead. The 21-year-old goaltender stopped 32 of 35 shots he faced — the only other goal he gave up came on an Isaac Lunderstrom penalty shot with 1:14 left in regulation to cut Florida’s lead to one.
Line shakeups
With Patric Hornqvist still day-to-day after leaving the Sharks game after a hit to the head and Matthew Tkachuk suspended after his high stick on Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick on Saturday, Paul Maurice shook up all four of his forward lines.
Colin White took Tkachuk’s spot on the right wing of Florida’s top line with Verhaeghe and Aleksander Barkov. Eetu Luostarinen moved up to the second line as the left wing alongside center Bennett and right wing Nick Cousins. Ryan Lomberg joined the third line at left wing with Anton Lundell at center and Reinhart at right wing. And the fourth line featured Rudolfs Balcers at left wing, Eric Staal at center and Aleksi Heponiemi (making his season debut) at right wing.
