Ducks get Trevor Zegras back but lose to Panthers again

ANAHEIM — The Ducks went toe-to-toe with the defending champions through two periods on Tuesday night, but they were tucked away summarily in the third as the Florida Panthers prevailed, 5-2, at Honda Center after winning by that same three-goal margin in Saturday’s shutout of the Ducks in Florida.

Opening-salvo goals by Frank Vatrano and Mason McTavish set up a vigorous effort in the middle frame, but the Ducks’ fancy-stat dominance didn’t translate to the scoreboard. Two goals surrendered in the opening five minutes of a lackluster third period condemned them to a defeat in which Lukáš Dostál turned in an off night, making 24 of 29 saves.

Trevor Zegras returned after missing 22 games (knee surgery) and registered four shots on goal as the Ducks lost their fourth straight game and their seventh in the past eight.

Sam Reinhart, Evan Rodrigues, Carter Verhaeghe, Sam Bennett and Uvis Balinskis each tallied for Florida. Verhaeghe added an assist while Mackie Samoskevich and Tomáš Nosek contributed two helpers apiece. Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 28 shots.

“If you give a team like that an inch, they’re going to put it in the back of your net. We were a little sloppy in our end, getting to our spots and positions,” Zegras said. “They were going to capitalize. We only got two, so it was going to be tough versus a team like that.”

Just 19 seconds into the third period, Florida reestablished its two-goal lead off the forecheck when Bennett went skate-to-blade to control a pass in the slot before rifling a shot through traffic. The Panthers extended their edge to 5-2 less than four minutes later behind another strong forecheck and Balinskis’ wrister from well above the hash marks, a seeing-eye shot through a goalie whose vision was limited by a heap of bodies.

Ducks coach Greg Cronin described Bennett’s strike as “a punch in the mouth,” and a preventable one at that. He said Balinskis’ goal “took some steam” out of his team.

“This third period was very uncharacteristic. We should have taken the momentum and carried into the third period. We’re scraping and clawing to get points here, we’re trying to stay in the playoff race,” Cronin said. “That was a period where we needed to have an A+ period, and we didn’t have it.”

These teams combined for a staggering 79 shots on goal Saturday and were on pace for 66 through two periods Tuesday, with each side heading to the dressing room with 22.

Territorially and analytically, the Ducks ruled, garnering what Natural Stat Trick scored as 82% of the expected goals in the stanza, but no expectations were realized in a scoreless 20 minutes.

“We had a lot of zone time. With that long [line] change, we had them in their end for good periods of time,” Zegras said. “It’s just tough when you don’t capitalize and get one or two to give you that extra boost going into the third, but I really liked our second period.”

Conversely, there were as many goals scored, three, in 75 seconds near the end of the first period as the teams combined for in a full hour of Saturday’s action, when Florida triumphed 3-0.

McTavish halved the Ducks’ deficit before the intermission with a short-side snipe. It completed a two-on-one break between him and Cutter Gauthier that was keyed by captain Radko Gudas, who earned the lone assist on McTavish’s seventh goal this season.

Florida had taken a two-goal lead when errors compounded for the Ducks. Jacob Trouba’s turnover deep in the Ducks’ end to Samoskevich allowed him to make the shortest of passes to Verhaeghe, who appeared to surprise Dostál with a sharp-angled attempt that beat him inside the near post.

“We just were in and out of it, in terms of focus,” Cronin said. “Turnovers, the third goal, all you have to do is rim the puck out, they’re changing, and we throw the puck back into the area where there’s a guy sitting.”

Dostál was also visibly upset with himself after Florida’s second goal. A partial odd-man rush with A.J Greer left Rodrigues with a shot from the right side, which Dostál stopped only to feel the follow-up bid bank off the back of his pad and into the net.

The opening period was exhilarating even beyond its copious close. The first 10 minutes of the match saw the Ducks draw two penalties, cashing in on one power play, with the Panthers providing a picturesque equalizer between those opportunities.

Gustav Forsling, who scored an empty-net goal against the Ducks on Saturday, pressured Troy Terry into a giveaway in the Ducks’ zone. From there, it was hijinks versus highlights, as the hosts couldn’t scramble to prevent a tic-tac-toe passing play between the visitors’ three star forwards. Aleksander Barkov and Matthew Tkachuk earned the assists 8:58 into the game, when Reinhart skated across the crease unmolested, going forehand to backhand around Dostál’s poke-check attempt to score with ease.

The Ducks darted out to a 1-0 lead less than five minutes after the puck dropped with some precise passing of their own. During their first power play, Ryan Strome dished from the goal line into the left circle for Terry, whose touch pass into the right slot for Vatrano gave him a no-doubt tally, his 12th goal of the year.

UP NEXT

The Ducks host the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday at 7 p.m.