KANATA, Ontario _ Who said the Florida Panthers lack a top line and that 44-year-old Jaromir Jagr is finally slowing down?
Panthers coach Gerard Gallant added a flu-weakened Jussi Jokinen to the slumping duo of Jagr and Aleksander Barkov and it equaled two goals and six points by the top line in the first eight minutes. Jagr finished with a goal and two assists.
That ignited a bounce-back 4-1 victory over the Ottawa Senators Saturday night at the Canadian Tire Centre that wouldn't have been possible without the acrobatic saves of Panthers goalie Roberto Luongo.
It was a matchup of two ornery, injury-wracked Atlantic Division opponents coming off season-worst losses. The Panthers, now 9-8-1, were routed 6-1 by the Maple Leafs on Thursday, and the host Senators (10-7-1) were throttled 5-1 by the Predators.
The Panthers emerged victorious and improved to 2-1 on this four-game road trip that ends Sunday evening against the offensive powerhouse Rangers in Madison Square Garden, a place of horrors for Florida over the years.
Luongo was as spectacular as his backup James Reimer was weak two nights earlier in making a season-high 39 saves, including a goalie-type hat trick by stopping elusive forward Ryan Dzingel on three separate breakaways en route to his third consecutive victory.
Leading 3-0 after two, Luongo's bid for a shutout went down the tubes when a fortunate carom off the end boards found Jean-Gabriel Pageau on the doorstep for a roofer at 4:45. The good news is that Panthers' fourth-line center Derek MacKenzie sealed the deal at 9:16 when his attempted pass to Jokinen came back to him for a swat-shot that dribbled over the goal-line for the captain's 100th career point.
The bad news is that MacKenzie was filling in for Barkov, who sat out the third period with an undisclosed injury after taking a punishing hit earlier in the game.
Jagr, the third leading goal scorer in NHL history had gone 13 games without lighting the lamp, matching the longest drought of his certain 23-season Hall of Fame career. That didn't include playoffs and the six games he went scoreless in the first-round series loss to the Islanders.
So the unusually clean-shaven Jagr, still sporting his iconic mullet, scored just 25 seconds after the opening faceoff for the fastest Panthers' goal of the season. Defenseman Keith Yandle's pass set up a 2-on-1 with Jagr and Barkov, whose cross-ice feed found No. 68 for a sweeping backhand past Senators goalie Craig Anderson, who dropped to 13-7-2 against his former team.
It was Jagr's second goal of the season, his 751st, first even-strength tally, and first since Oct. 20. At 12 minutes, Jagr hit Barkov, who dished a centering pass to Jokinen, whose wrister between the dots beat Anderson's glove for his first goal of the season.
Barkov, still mired in a 16-game goal drought, notched his first two-point game since Oct. 20.
While Luongo continued to stand on his head making a point-blank stop on Derick Brassard and then somehow closed the back door on Pageau' wide-open shot outside the crease, the Panthers grabbed the all-important 3-0 lead at 15:05 of the second when Jon Marchessault batted in a loose puck off a slapper by Jason Demers' for his team-leading ninth goal
Luongo topped Anderson, his former practice partner, who has been going through an emotional roller coaster since his wife, Nicholle, was diagnosed with a form of throat cancer last month.
Anderson, 35, who gave up two goals on Florida's first three shots, has been traveling back and forth to his family home in Coral Springs, Fla., and now to Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York to be with his wife. Anderson met Nicholle while with the Panthers (2006-09) when she was working at the Roundup, a country-western bar, as well as a school teacher at Fox Trail Elementary, both in Davie, Fla.
"From a father and husband standpoint as I am and he is, I can't imagine what he's going through," said MacKenzie, who practices with Anderson in the Panthers IceDen over the summer. "It says a lot about who he is, what kind of teammate he is and what kind of professional he is. That's why he's had such a great career. We're all thinking about him regardless of whatever happens. It's just a game. My hat goes off to him. He sets the bar pretty high." ...
With the flu-bug flowing through the Panthers' dressing room and a back-to-back set, Gallant scratched forwards Kyle Rau and Greg McKegg, while inserting Shawn Thornton and Jared McCann on the fourth line. He also started AHL call-up defenseman Jakub Kindl with Aaron Ekblad, for his first game of the season.
