Jesper Boqvist sniped a deciding breakaway at 2:05 of overtime as the Boston Bruins earned a 3-2 win over the visiting Florida Panthers in a key Atlantic Division clash on Saturday afternoon.
Boqvist made the winning play happen all by himself, coming away with the puck out of a defensive-zone wall battle before breaking down the left side circle.
Charlie McAvoy and Charlie Coyle also scored for Boston (46-17-15), which has won four straight and holds a five-point lead atop the division standings.
Linus Ullmark made 28 saves in the Bruins net.
Matthew Tkachuk and Aleksander Barkov each scored a goal while Gustav Forsling dished out two assists for Florida (48-24-6), which is just 2-4-1 over its last seven games.
Florida’s Sergei Bobrovsky made 26 stops.
The Panthers had a 30-29 shot advantage. Boston scored the only power-play goal in eight total chances between the teams.
It took the visitors only 37 seconds to score as an awkward carom off the end glass bounced right to Tkachuk, who moved down the slot and ripped a shot upstairs on Ullmark.
McAvoy answered at 5:42 to level the score at 1-1, taking Danton Heinen’s backhand pass from along the left-wing wall and stepping into a wrister between the circles.
Bobrovsky made several strong saves midway through the second to keep the game tied, including a cross-crease pad stop on Morgan Geekie, who corralled a Brad Marchand pass in the right circle.
The game’s seventh total power play resulted in Boston scoring a go-ahead goal with 4:15 remaining in the second. Coyle drove down the slot and redirected Marchand’s feed from the top of the left circle.
One of Ullmark’s highlight stops came 3:55 into the third when he drove across the crease to rob Sam Bennett’s redirect, but the Boston lead didn’t last for more than two more minutes.
Barkov scored the tying goal for Florida at 5:24, collecting the rebound of a Sam Reinhart shot from the right side just outside the opposite crease.
The game reached overtime after Marchand and Geekie both had chances to pot a loose puck amidst a scramble in the crease during the final minute of regulation.
–Field Level Media
