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The Columbus Blue Jackets may not be currently holding a playoff spot but they sure played like it on Thursday night.
Hosting the Florida Panthers, Columbus was fast and physical, giving the Cats just about all they could handle.
Fortunately for Florida, Sergei Bobrovsky was excellent between the pipes and held the Blue Jackets at bay just long enough the Panthers to squeak out the victory in overtime.
The road trip is almost over, folks.
Let’s get to Thursday’s takeaways:
A CRUCIAL WIN
There are several reasons that Florida absolutely needed to pick up two points on Thursday.
A couple of the main one are that the Panthers were coming off back-to-back defeats which has led to a logjam atop the Atlantic Division standings.
After several days off to get rested and get right, the Cats got back to playing their brand of physical, tight checking hockey, and got out of Ohio with the dub.
“Credit to Columbus, they’ve got one of the best home records in the league, and they've got one of the highest scoring teams in the league,” said Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice. “Clearly this is an important game, all these teams that are fighting for their playoff lives. I like the fact that we've been able to play in tight games. I've been saying that for two months. I think we've, even in the two we lost last week, they're pretty tight the third, so to come out with a win after losing two is important.”
FELT LIKE POSTSEASON HOCKEY
Low scoring, hard hitting, intense hockey.
That’s what we were treated to on Thursday night, and that’s what many of us are looking forward to getting once the playoffs arrive next month.
While sure, another goal or two wouldn’t hurt, what we saw on Thursday in Columbus is so much of what makes hockey the best.
The emotions, the edge-of-your-seat excitement, stretched out over a seven-game series…this next month won’t go by fast enough!
“That's what it's going to look like when we get into the playoffs, it's not flowing up and down the ice,” Maurice said. “What you like is these are real games, and sometimes you get to this point, you end up playing a bunch of teams that are either already in for sure or already out, and neither of those games are playoff-real. When you look at the last nine games that we play, every single one of them is going to be a grinder, and it's going to be exactly the hockey that we'll see if we get enough points to get in.”
STILL PLENTY TO FIGHT FOR
There is no price for holding first place in the division a month before the playoffs start.
Florida has worked extremely hard to earn their spot in the standings, but that work will be all for not if they can’t keep their collective foot on the gas pedal and ride that momentum into the playoffs.
As Maurice was very quick to point out after the game, there is no X next to Florida’s name in the standings.
They have a long way to go before they can start reaching goals, and everyone in that room should fully understand that, as it’s been Maurice’s show for three years now.
“Well, we're not the playoffs, that's the key piece,” Maurice said. “Eighty-five points coming in tonight is not getting the playoffs, so we got lots of work to do. We're going to be challenging that work between schedules and injuries, but you can really find some good things with your team when you're facing that kind of adversity. When you look at the schedule that we'll face on the way out, we're getting all teams exactly like Columbus or teams we're fighting for the division lead, so they're all meaningful. Road wins always feel better because the guys get to enjoy them together, and then we'll go in and play the best team of the East and try to do it again.”
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