Sunrise, FL (Sports Network) - Scott Clemmensen made 34 saves and the Florida
Panthers captured the Southeast Division title with a 4-1 win over the
Carolina Hurricanes in the regular-season finale on Saturday.
Florida earned the No. 3 seed and will face the sixth-seeded New Jersey Devils
when the playoffs begin next week. It will be the team's first appearance in
the playoffs since they lost to New Jersey in the first round in 1999-2000.
Mikael Samuelsson had a goal and two assists while Marcel Goc scored one goal
with one assist. John Madden and Stephen Weiss also found the back of the net
for the Panthers (38-26-18), who snapped a five-game skid.
Joni Pitkanen scored the only goal for the Hurricanes (33-33-16), who finished
last in the Southeast Division. Brian Boucher was tagged for three goals on 25
shots.
Florida opened the scoring just over four minutes into the contest when Dmitry
Kulikov sent a pass from the right point off an offensive zone draw down low
for Goc, who stick-handled around a poke-check attempt by Boucher and fired it
into the empty cage for the early lead.
It was 2-0 for the Panthers at 6:43 of the opening period when Ed Jovanovski
threw a shot on net from the left point that was stopped by the right pad of
Boucher. Madden pounced on the rebound in front and sent it to Tomas Kopecky
on the right wing before getting it back and stuffing it past Boucher.
The Panthers extended their lead to 3-0 with a power-play tally at 10;06 of
the second period when Samuelsson let a shot slap shot go from the point that
was stopped by Boucher, but the rebound fell right to an unchecked Weiss and
he fired it home.
Carolina got on the board with a power-play goal at 8:26 of the third period
when Eric Staal won an offensive zone draw back to Pitkanen, who blasted it
past Clemmensen to make it 3-1.
Samuelsson added an empty-netter with 1:24 to play to cap the scoring.
Game Notes
Both teams finished 1-for-2 with the man advantage...Carolina missed the
playoffs for the third consecutive season...Hurricanes forward Jeremy Welsh
made his NHL debut.
The Sports Network