Bruins left wing Brad Marchand suspected that the Florida Panthers would be a tough first-round opponent in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Marchand’s suspicions were confirmed in the third period on Wednesday night’s 6-3 loss to the Panthers in Game 2 of the series at the TD Garden. The Panthers tied the series at 1-1 and will host the Bruins in Game 3 on Friday night (7:30) at FLA Live Arena in Sunrise, Fla.
“We knew it was going to be a hard series and definitely not one that we expected to walk through,” said Marchand. “They play well at home and we have our work cut for us and we have to make sure we bring our best.
“It’s one game at a time. Well forget about this one now and regroup. But if we don’t bring our best game it is going to be a rough trip so we have to make sure we are ready for them.”
Marchand had a rough night in the event summary despite scoring the Bruins’ first goal while short-handed that tied the game 1-1 at 12:13 of the second period.
Marchand logged 19:43 first-line minutes with four shots and finished with a minus two. Marchand was also on the business end of some serious hard cheap shots, one of which resulted in a cross-checking penalty assessed the Panthers’ Ryan Lomberg at 10:56 of the first.
“They played really hard and they played really desperate and we need to be better,” said Marchand. “We need to execute better and we need to play all the way through at our level and we haven’t done that yet.
“We can be better and we have an opportunity to see where we can improve and get back in it.”
The two areas the Bruins need to improve on are faceoffs and giveaways. The Bruins could have used center Patrice Bergeron in the faceoff circle, but he has missed both games with an undisclosed injury. The Panthers won 54% of the faceoffs led by Alexander Barkov (11) and Anton Lundell (9).
The Bruins turned the puck over 15 times in the game, putting goaltender Linus Ullmark in some uncompromising situations. That was certainly the case on Florida’s first goal, that was set motion by a lazy clearing pass by Brandon Carlo. Matthew Tkachuk knocked down Carlo’s rainbow and fed Sam Bennett, who was left unattended between the circle. Bennett closed on Ullmark and went five-hole for his first of the playoffs.
The Panthers went up 4-2 at 7:00 of the third when Bennett nailed McAvoy on the half wall that sent a loose puck drifting towards Tkachuk at the blue line. Carter Verhaeghe took a feed from Tkachuk in the low slot and wristed it high inside the near post.
“They put on a lot of pressure, they were playing really fast,” said Marchand. “They were attacking and playing really hard and they are a tough team to play against.
“They played fast, they were moving pucks and getting in on the forecheck. We didn’t take care of pucks at some point.”