{"id":574357,"date":"2026-04-01T04:04:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T04:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/574357\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T04:04:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T04:04:10","slug":"florida-panthers-strike-fast-chase-linus-ullmark-in-win-over-ottawa-senators","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/574357\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Panthers strike fast, chase Linus Ullmark in win over Ottawa Senators"},"content":{"rendered":"

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) \u2014 Noah Gregor<\/a> scored eight seconds into the game to open an early five-goal barrage by Florida, Matthew Tkachuk<\/a> had his first four-point game since December 2024, and the Panthers defeated the Ottawa Senators<\/a> 6-3 on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

Carter Verhaeghe<\/a> scored two goals and added an assist for Florida, while Seth Jones<\/a> had three assists \u2014 including one on Gregor\u2019s history-making goal.<\/p>\n

Gregor\u2019s goal was the fastest to open a game in Panthers history \u2014 two seconds ahead of Johan Garpenlov<\/a>\u2019s goal at the 10-second mark of a game against Colorado in October 1996 \u2014 and the fastest to start a game in the NHL this season.<\/p>\n

A.J. Greer<\/a> and Mackie Samoskevich<\/a> also scored for Florida, while Sam Bennett<\/a> added two assists and Daniil Tarasov<\/a> stopped 22 shots for the Panthers.<\/p>\n

Drake Batherson<\/a>, Jordan Spence<\/a> and Michael Amadio<\/a> scored for Ottawa, which has gone 0-2-1 in its last three games as it chases a wild-card berth in the Eastern Conference. Linus Ullmark<\/a> started and stopped 11 of 16 shots before getting chased after Florida took a 5-0 lead with 5:24 left in the first period.<\/p>\n

James Reimer<\/a> replaced Ullmark and stopped 12 of 13 shots.<\/p>\n

Matthew Tkachuk<\/a> had a goal and three assists in the game. It was the 25th time he\u2019s gone head-to-head in the NHL with his brother Brady Tkachuk<\/a>, the Senators\u2019 captain; Matthew Tkachuk<\/a>\u2019s teams have now won 15 of those meetings.<\/p>\n

Linesman Brad Kovachik worked regular-season game No. 1,972 of his career \u2014 and it\u2019ll be the last. The veteran of three decades is retiring, ending a career that saw him work the Stanley Cup final in five different years, as well as the 2014 Sochi Olympics.<\/p>\n

Players from both teams lined up to shake Kovachik\u2019s hand during a first-period stoppage in play.<\/p>\n

UP NEXT<\/p>\n

Senators: Host the Buffalo Sabres<\/a> on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Panthers: Host the Boston Bruins<\/a> on Thursday.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP NHL: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/nhl<\/p>\n

Tim Reynolds, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) \u2014 Noah Gregor scored eight seconds into the game to open an early five-goal barrage…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574358,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[49,48,20739,82],"class_list":["post-574357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ottawa","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-ottawa","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=574357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/574358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}