SUNRISE–It was only one win for the Florida Panthers Tuesday that and that one was off the ice. Inside BB&T Center, the second place Ottawa Senators continued their strong play in claiming a 4-2 win over the Panthers in Florida’s first home game since their 4-1 road trip.
Florida grabbed a 1-0 lead at 7:49 of the opening period on Logan Shaw’s first NHL goal. After Ottawa tied the game on a power play goal by Zack Smith early in the second, the Panthers Reilly Smith (no relation) scored his seventh of the season at 13:58.
Ottawa erased that advantage to tie the game at 2-2 when Kyle Turris scored a power play goal at 0:51 of the final period. The back and forth game favored the Senators until Mike Hoffman scored his 15th of the season for the Senators at 14:23 for the game winner. With Panthers goalie Roberto Luongo on the bench during a Florida power play, Ottawa’s Jean-Gabriel Pageau finished off the scoring with an empty net, short-handed goal to seal the victory against the usually strong-finishing Panthers on this night.
The Panthers top line was scoreless. Jonathon Huberdeau and Aleksander Barkov had three shots while Jaromir Jagr had two. Highlights and stats from nhl.com can be seen here:
http://www.nhl.com/gamecenter/en/recap?id=2015020412&navid=sb:recap&intcmpid=sb-highlights
The Panthers lost a chance to gain on the Senators in the Atlantic division, and also Detroit, which picked up a point in a shootout lose to Washington to match the Senators record.
No movement on the Jagr-O-Meter Tuesday night.
All Star Voting: Jaromir Jagr tops Atlantic Division vote-getters and is second overall to Arizona’s John Scott, who is benefiting from a highly successful underground campaign to put him in as captain of the Pacific Divison’s squad in the first-time ever three-on-three tournament. To date, fans have ignored Jagr’s recent request to vote for younger players as his nearest competitor, PK Subban, is seventh in the overall voting. Ahh, the beauty of the democratic process with on-line voting.
The Panthers host Washington Thursday night, before playing their final four road games of December. Florida will finish 2015 with four home games and start 2016 with a pair. Tickets and great packages for home games can be secured at http://www.floridapanthers.com.
Despite the loss to Ottawa, Off the ice It was a great day for the Florida Panthers. The ownership group led by Vinnie Viola and Doug Cifu received final approval for the reworked arena package they had sought since taking over the team in 2013. The deals gives them relief, indemnifies Broward County should something go wrong down the road and gives the county development rights to the land near the arena. The Sun Sentinel published this report after earlier in the day calling for approval of the plan in an editorial.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fl-panthers-subsidy-vote-20151208-story.html
With expansion teams going for $500 million dollars, the county kept theirs in an existing arena for a fraction of a cost giving a large metropolitan area a team they can call their own.
Assorted Jagr-related links:
Florida Panthers 2015-16 Media Guide
http://panthers.nhl.com/v2/ext/Florida201516MediaGuide_web.pdf
Florida Panthers Team website: http://www.floridapanthers.com
Some Jagr-related social media accounts:
@68Jagr This is the real site, the one and only official Jaromir Jagr twitter account. Postings are rare.
The two best Jagr facebook pages are: https://www.facebook.com/68Jagr/ This is the page Jagr posts on, if he is going to post at all.
Another good facebook page is one produced by someone in the Czech Republic. It has more than 100,000 likes. This is not the official page, but it is very good.
https://www.facebook.com/JaromirJagrfan/?fref=nf
@FlaPanthers and @FLAPanthersPR The official twitter accounts for news about the team.
@dougielarge Doug Cifu, few owners in sports relate to the fans as much as this man who interacts with fans and media on twitter.
@goldieonice — Steve Goldstein, TV play-by-play of the Panthers. Brings all those exciting highlights to life.
@DenisPotvinFox — NHL Hall of Famer Denis Potvin works along side Goldstein in the booth.
@HeyRedDeer color man Randy Moller who left the radio booth to help Goldstein and Potvin on TV.
@GeorgeRichards Panthers beat writer for the Miami Herald.
@HFialkov Panthers beat writer for the Sun Sentinel
@AntwanStaley Includes Panthers coverage in his all sports all the time reports
@Cats0ntheprowl twitter for Cats On the Prowl, offering detailed reviews of Panthers games and more.
@SunshineSkate twitter for The Sunshine Skate, another blog with special emphasis on advanced stats and charts that will make you dizzy.
@Zdenek_Janda US-based Czech reporter who covers the NHL and reports on other news for the people of the Czech Republic.
@Jsmidcro Jan Smid was a US-based Czech reporter who collaborated on “Jagr”, an autobiography in the late 90’s detailing Jagr’s early life and career in the NHL.
@NHLHistoryGirl This hockey loving woman shares interesting informational tidbits about hockey and the NHL in general. How does she do it?
@MyRegularFace She’s another gem. Watches lots of games and gets up GIFs faster than nhl.com or anyone else out there.
@KrRutherford Kristina Rutherford wrote a great article for Canada’s sportsnet magazine.
Nigel Buchanan, whose superhero treatment of Jagr in his art for sportsnet magazine is one of the many efforts he has on display at http://www.nigelbuchanan.com.
Quant Hockey: Career stats updated game by game by a hockey lover in Europe. Site enables you to find career leaders in any offensive category by clicking on the category you are researching.
http://www.quanthockey.com/nhl/records/nhl-players-all-time-points-leaders.html
@rytiriKladno The Kladno Hockey Club: Before coming to the NHL Jagr played for this team in the Czech league as a teenager. Now he owns the team. It’s in Czech but some devices can translate to English. Follow them at:
@HockeyCzech National organization for hockey in the Czech Republic.
@68isgr8 is the twitter for The Traveling Jagrs. Clad in different Jagr jerseys and hair styles from 68’s career, they gained league-wide recognition when they caught Jagr’s attention during a pre-game skate of a Dallas Stars game in Canada during the 2012-2013 season. Since then, they convene at games in Western Canada and make a road trip or two every year, playing street hockey with locals, posing for hundreds of pictures, and having a good time with fans while honoring an all-time NHL legend.
https://twitter.com/search?q=traveling%20jagrs&src=savs.
Ray Haluska aka Kladno Jagr, curator of the Jagr-O-Meter