After a sleepy first period in Ottawa on Thursday night, Florida threw everything they could at Ullmark, but the newly acquired Senators netminder was just too good.
That first period cost the Panthers, but it was ultimately Ullmark that was the difference. The Sens look to have a talented roster, and with Ullmark in net, they could be pretty good. One thing I noticed was that they have some speedy players with snappy shots. They certainly caught the Cats flat-footed in the first 20 minutes.
Of course, the big news to come out of Thursday’s loss was that of the injury to Barkov, who went legs-first awkwardly into the boards trying to chase down a loose puck and save an empty-netter dagger.
He is out for today’s tilt against the Buffalo Sabres, with the severity of the injury being a bit cloudy at the moment.
More injury-related news prior to today’s game:
It’s somewhat surprising to see the Sabres start the season 0-3-0. For a team that has been forever directionless, it seemed like they were getting matters in order the past couple seasons, and very close to taking the next step. This start has to be tough on the morale early on.
As one fan pointed out in the comments of another Panthers site, losing to the Senators doesn’t sting that bad considering the team they have put together, but losing to the Sabres will sting a lot.
And so the Panthers must start on time from the opening puck drop. They did this Game 1 against the Bruins and had great results. They didn’t do this against Ottawa and it contributed to their loss.
Some encouraging news is that it looks like Adam Boqvist will be back in the lineup after taking a puck to the chiclets on Tuesday. He is a guy that is unfortunately injury-prone, but I want to see him get a bunch of games in so we know the kind of player he is/can be because if healthy, I really feel he could be another Forsling type bargain.
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See you guys at puck drop…Go Panthers!
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