Paul Maurice has a full blown meltdown on the bench, throws tantrum of the century before Panthers come back to beat Leafs
The Florida Panthers skated away with a 3-2 victory last night in Toronto against the Leafs, but the final score was not a good indicator of how the game unfolded. The Buds outshot the Panthers 40-29 and dominated in the faceoff dot, winning more than 65% of the faceoffs. The difference in this one ended up being special teams, with Florida going 1/4 on the power play, while the Leafs went 0/4.
During the second period, after the Leafs had just tied the game at 1-1, they had appeared to score what would have been the go-ahead goal, to go up by a score of 2-1, thanks to a sweet feed from Auston Matthews and a brilliant finish by Calle Jarnkrok. The only problem was that the play was ruled offside. Still, that didn't prevent Panthers head coach Paul Maurice from absolutely ripping into his team, repeatedly calling them "f***ing b*tches".
At the time of the outburst, the Leafs were nearly tripling the Panthers in shots, but what happened following Maurice's fit of rage was the Panthers players waking up, banding together and pushing back. They eventually tied the game late, thanks to a power play goal from Sam Reinhart, to force overtime. Following a sequence in which Florida netminder Alex Lyon made the save of his entire career on Auston Matthews, the Cats used the momentum from that game-saving stop, resulting in a record-setting goal from Brandon Montour, who became the first Panthers defenseman to reach 62 points in a single season.
Following the game, Maurice explained the reason for his outburst, saying:
He also credited the team for coming back to win the game, essentially in spite of him and his behaviour in the 2nd period.
