The Florida Panthers are a mostly anonymous cast of characters–no Lindros or Messier, just guys named Laus and Murphy. But the Pittsburgh Penguins certainly know them now.
John Vanbiesbrouck frustrated the Penguins, Tom Fitzgerald finished them off with two goals and the Panthers seized the lead in the Eastern Conference finals with a 5-1 victory Saturday night.
“We have a lot of heroes every night,” Fitzgerald said. “A different guy comes up every night. That’s what the Florida Panthers are all about.”
Vanbiesbrouck, the Panthers’ biggest star so far during the third-year franchise’s surprising playoff run, stopped 32 of 33 shots for his first victory in six career playoff starts against the Penguins.
Pittsburgh failed to get a goal from either Mario Lemieux or Jaromir Jagr for the first time in 12 playoff games and only the fourth time all season.
“Johnny had to make huge saves because they got some room in situations with some of the stars they have,” Panthers coach Doug MacLean said.
Dave Lowry scored a power-play goal with 1 minutes 52 seconds gone, supplying the early momentum that allowed Vanbiesbrouck to constantly turn aside the Penguins’ platoon of big-name scorers. Lowry added his ninth of the playoffs–he had only 10 during the season–to make it 4-1 at 15:41 of the third.
The Penguins are 6-10 in playoff openers since 1991, but won seven of the previous nine series in which they lost the opener.
“We always lose the first game,” Jagr said. “So the next game is a very important game.”
