Patrick Kane scored the go-ahead goal in the third period as the New York Rangers rallied past the Florida Panthers, 4-3, on Saturday night in Sunrise, Fla.
The Rangers (43-20-10, 96 points) are 8-1-1 in their last 10 games.
It was Kane’s 20th goal of the season and his fourth since being acquired by the Rangers 12 games ago. It was also the 15th time in 16 years that Kane has scored 20 goals in a season.
Kaapo Kakko, Filip Chytil and Alexis Lafreniere — known as New York’s “Kid Line” — each scored one goal and had one assist for the Rangers, who got 31 saves from backup goalie Jaroslav Halak.
Florida got two goals from captain Aleksander Barkov and one from third-line forward Ryan Lomberg. But it wasn’t enough as the Panthers (36-30-7, 79 points) lost their third straight game.
Barkov recorded his 20th goal of the season and has now reached that mark eight years in a row.
Panthers goalie Sergei Bobrovsky made 38 saves, but Florida is 0-3-0 against New York this season.
Florida led 2-0 after a first period in which it had 12 of the 15 shots on goal.
The Panthers opened the scoring with 9:15 gone as Barkov dove to tap in a rebound.
Florida made it 2-0 with 5:14 left in the first as Lomberg took a pass from Marc Staal and beat Halak off the right post.
The Rangers, however, tied the score with a dominant second period, producing a 22-9 advantage in shots on goal.
At the 8:50 mark, Kakko came flying in to shove home a rebound after an initial shot form Chytil was saved by Bobrovsky.
Lafreniere made it 2-2 with 1:45 left in the period as Florida’s defense was overloaded to stop Jacob Trouba, who had the puck on the left side. Trouba delivered a cross-ice pass to Lafreniere, who swooped in with a nifty move to beat Bobrovsky on the short side.
The Rangers took a 3-2 lead 1:22 into the third as Kane, looking to dish to Artemi Panarin, had his pass tipped in accidentally by Florida’s Carter Verhaeghe.
New York made it 4-2 with 6:18 expired in the third as the puck jumped over the stick of Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad. Chytil pounced for a breakaway goal.
With 13:00 left, Florida cut its deficit to 4-3 on another Barkov rebound goal. This one was set up by a Verhaeghe wraparound attempt.
–Field Level Media
