FORT LAUDERDALE — Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice said after Sunday’s overtime loss to the New York Rangers that he wanted his team to chew on the bad taste for a little bit.
There was plenty to feel good about, sure, but the reality is, his team lost an important playoff game — one it should have won.
Florida dominated big parts of that game, yet not only could not put the Rangers away, but only had the lead once at 1-0 off a power-play goal from Sam Reinhart 2:50 in.
“Why would we flush that one?” Maurice said on Monday. “We put up 108 [shot attempts], gave up [43].
“Where can we get better? Where can we turn that into a win? We came to the rink today determined to find answers.’’
The Panthers did not practice Monday but did hold plenty of meetings and went through their off-ice workouts.
The mood did not seem somber nor overly excited.
The Panthers appear to be handling this 2-1 defict in the best-of-7 series quite professionally.
“It’s the playoffs and there are going to be big swings from one game, one goal,’’ Sam Bennett said. “That is what the playoffs are like. You have to control your emotions, work on the parts of the game you need to work on. We went over it. Take the good stuff — we did a lot of good things last night.’’
“I think you sit on it a little bit,’’ Bennett said. “Obviously it stung. But, you wake up today, it’s a new day. Another opportunity tomorrow and that’s really the only way you can go about it. I think we did a good job, everyone’s in good spirits today. That’s where our focus is.’’
Florida did have a couple of breakdowns on Sunday night, the biggest coming on the overtime winner when Evan Rodrigues won the faceoff in the defensive zone but the Rangers got to it; Alex Wennberg found his way to the net uncontested and knocked in the point shot from Ryan Lindgren to win it.
Maurice said that play was watched once in the team meeting.
It was an unfortunate and uncharactaristic defensive breakdown by the Panthers.
It just happened to be in overtime of a playoff game.
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