The Florida Panthers still had hope heading into the third period of a 6-1 loss to the Dallas Stars.
Their captain, Derek MacKenzie, said as much after the game and really you can’t fault that view. It was still 3-1 and despite a fracas-filled contest, the Panthers actual had been testing Stars goalie Ben Bishop for much of the night.
But then this happened 5 minutes, 16 seconds into the third period.
The Swedes, John Klingberg and Mattias Janmark, will make the final highlight, but this play starts with Devin Shore’s play on the zone entry. Shore holds up, essentially puts the entire defense off balance, and makes a smart, simple pass through a small lane to Klingberg who is entering the zone with speed.
This is where Klingberg takes over. He has space and room to work, and makes a perfect pass to set up Janmark.
Janmark does the easy thing, but he also does the right thing on this play. He stops at the net, when you stop at the net good things happen.
The goal put the game out of reach. The back-to-back strikes by Alexander Radulov and Tyler Pitlick later in the period were an exclamation point, but this play really broke the Panthers spirit and any chance of a comeback.
Christopher Story says
That was an amazing goal… Klingberg’s patience in the zone was what made the play.