Cats Win! Cats Win!
You know what this means: the Florida Panthers are undeafeated.
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Look how happy they are! It's like they're a real team!
The Florida Panthers are undeafeated!
Woooooo!
Sure, they're just 1-0 (haters gonna hate), but what a 1 it was: Florida came back three times to force overtime, survived a defensive stand, and then took the formidable Chicago Blackhawks in a shootout to win, 4-3.
Must be the fresh juju of new GM Randy Sexton, whose promotion was announced just hours before the first puck of the seaon dropped in Helsinki today.
It's a great hire for the Panthers, and not just because for once it doesn't involve the dearly (coughcough) departed Jacques Martin. Sexton just guided the Panthers through a tricky summer, what with no budget and ownership in flux and the continuing mad machinations of the Alan Cohen/Michael Yormack debacleship (it's like leadership, but poor).
Sexton's resumé was screaming on its own behalf: he saved draft day by squeezing something out of Jay Bouwmeester's free agency flight and later convinced Jordan Leopold to stick around and help replace ol' Jay-Bo. Then he nabbed a couple choice youngsters, signed up Dennis Seidenberg and Scott Clemmensen, and refused to let Dmitry Kulikov slip back into the KHL with weeks of deft negotiation and a deal just in the nick of time.
Considering Sunrise isn't a young boy's dream, Sexton proved he could make lemonade out of some pretty cheap fruit.
As for the game, the Panthers showed they actually can claw themselves out of a hole, despite nine years of not doing it. Honors for the first goal on Finnish soil go to Chicago's Patrick Kane, who didn't have to assault Tomas Vokoun to do it. So maybe he's maturing. But that didn't keep the Panthers down: Michael Frolik responded, and then helped Ville Koistinen to a goal in his home country, so that David Booth's unassisted score in the 3rd period sent the game into extra minutes (that one we can't credit to Sexton's ascension -- it belongs to either animal print Camaro seats or running in sand with a weight vest).
Overtime, however, was scoreless, so shootout it was. Steve Reinprecht knocked one in, Ville Koistinen nabbed a second, and though Vokoun couldn't stop Jonathan Toews, he blocked Kane and Patrick Sharp for the win. Two points!
Tomorrow: more Blackhawks. And maybe 2-0! Can you stand it?
Hometown hero
Copyright NBC Owned Television Stations
Posted Friday, Oct 2, 2009 - 5:02 PM EST
