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Up two goals at the end of period one, Paul MacLean's troops headed into the locker room with a cushion - just forty minutes away from a well-earned two road points down in Florida.
Then, the train derailed.
The Florida Panthers rattled off four consecutive goals, winning back momentum early in the second and taking the uptempo Ottawa Senators out of their element in the crunch-time. For Florida, the game was pretty damn close to a must-win, so full credit has to head in the direction of head coach Kevin Dineen.
Ottawa's meltdown at BankAtlantic Center is, quite frankly, baffling. The Senators had received goals from the likes of Jared Cowen and Chris Neil(secondary scoring?!) early, and looked like they were in complete control of a team they had beaten nine consecutive times. Robin Lehner had very little pressure on his end, and the compete level was dialed up.
The next forty? Gruesome, to say the least. Florida rattled off four straight goals, with three in the second from Marcel Goc, Krys Barch, and Mikael Samuelsson, turning the twenty-year old goaltender Robin Lehner completely inside-out.
It's hard to put a ton of blame on Lehner, as the defense in front was pretty porous. And, to make matters worse, Ottawa kept taking dumb penalty after dumb penalty. Jason Spezza's meaningless shove at center ice for two was bad, Chris Neil's four-minute high sticking in the Florida crease was ugly, and Erik Karlsson's vicious two-hander on Sean Bergenheim was another level of egregious.
Still, even with the team lacking any kind of intensity or fight, Ottawa stayed within a goal until Jack Skille delivered the dagger late in the third, blowing by Erik Karlsson and beating Robin Lehner top-shelf.
With the win, Florida moved their playoff probability to a shade under 80%, with Ottawa slipping to about 89%. In short: The two points were huge for the Panthers in the playoff race.
For Paul MacLean, he's going to be left with a number of questions - some of which we already saw answered late in the game. Bobby Butler was finally yanked off of the top-line - something that probably should've happened a long time ago. Not to be harsh on the kid, but as I've stated exhaustively, one goal on Jason Spezza's wing since January 11th is pretty absurd.
Past Butler, MacLean's going to have to decide whether or not this game should fall at least somewhat on the shoulders of Robin Lehner. Do you go with the kid Tuesday against Tampa Bay in a close-to-must-win game? Or, do you opt for the likes of Alex Auld/Ben Bishop?
One thing I know MacLean's going to do: Keep Rob Klinkhammer and Jim O'Brien in the linep. For all sixty minutes, these two were the best forwards on the ice for Ottawa, throwing the body around and playing like they were hungry - check that, starving.
Zack Smith's one-game lesson should just be one-game. I'd imagine Bobby Butler could be headed upstairs sooner rather than later. If not Butler, one of the other underachieving forwards from lines two through four.
Ottawa's four-game road sweep gave them comfortable positioning in the standings, but a pair of regulation losses to Chicago and Florida are forcing the issue a bit here. The team needs to get back on track, but they're going to have to do so against a wildly desperate Lightning club. Not good.
Florida's back in action on Thursday against the Philadelphia Flyers.
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