NHL Update: Atlanta Thrashers beat Florida Panthers, 3-2
Alexander Burmistrov tallied the game-winner goal in a shootout to carry Atlanta Thrashers to a remarkable 3-2 victory over Florida Panthers on Monday night.
Bryan Little added a goal and assisted once for Atlanta, which snapped a four-game losing streak. Chris Thorburn also lit the lamp while Ondrej Pavelec stopped 38 out of a total of 40 shots
for the victors.
Dmitry Kulikov and Dennis Wideman both found the net for Florida, which had won three consecutive games and was unable to win four in a row for the first time since March 2008. Stephen Weiss
assisted twice while Scott Clemmensen was dented for three goals on 31 shots in the losing effort.
After two goalless periods, the game scoring opened up offensively in the final period.
Steve Bernier got an opportunity to put Panthers on board 2½ minutes into the third
period when he had a wide open net to shoot at, but Atlanta defenceman Ron Hainsey maintained the goal-less contest by making a diving stop.
After the Atlanta’s defensive stand, it had two costly hiccups after one minute. First, it was called for too many men on the ice and just after 20 seconds, Johnny Oduya was called for holding
to give Thrashers a 5-on-3 power play.
Florida got another chance and made Thrashers pay early on a power-play with seamless disc movement. The play was set up when Mike Santorelli tipped the puck across the middle of the Atlanta
zone to Wideman. Wideman then controlled the puck in the right circle and flipped a wrist shot past Pavelec for a 1-0 lead.
“I thought we deserved to win that game,” Wideman said. “We played well. The first goal, the puck was just bouncing around all over the place, we just couldn’t find it, ended up going right
to one of their guys and he bats it in. The second was kind of a fluky one again.
Penalties continued to haunt Atlanta when Tobias Enstrom came for slashing in the seventh minute of the final period and Panthers took advantage again to make it a two-goal game.
Kulikov, while skating in front of the net, ripped a short backhand just 20 seconds into the power-play. Pavelec turned aside the shot but it caromed off of Brent Sopel's leg and into the
net for a 2-0 lead.
Thrashers mounted the comeback when they pulled Pavelec for an extra attacker with two minutes left in the third period.
Atlanta made it 2-1 game when Little took a rebound and chipped a loose puck home during a scramble in front of the net.
Atlanta tried its luck once more and called Pavelec after the ensuing face-off. The play was set up again by Little when he fired a shot from the point toward the net. Thorburn redirected
the shot past Clemmensen to tie the game at 2 and send the game into extra session.
“It’s disappointing enough to give up that lead and give them a point to go to overtime and then to lose that extra point as well,” Clemmensen said. “It’s disappointing, especially the way
it happened there in the last two minutes.”
Both teams failed to score in the overtime, which set up the shootout.
Burmistrov gave Thrashers one-goal edge with his game-winning shootout goal to seal the win at 3-2. He made it look easy with a quick wrist shot that sailed past Florida netminder's glove
hand.
Then Ondrej Pavelec blocked Cory Stillman's shot during Panthers ensuing shootout effort to preserve the victory.
“That’s a dramatic one to pull out,” Atlanta coach Craig Ramsay said. “We are fun to watch. We don’t quit. Very seldom do the boys give up.”
Tags: