Spencer Knight nearly flawless in goal as Panthers bottle up Ducks, 3-0

The Florida Panthers’ decision to stand by Spencer Knight during his public battle with obsessive-compulsive disorder was more than the right thing to do. It also was the smart thing to do.

Knight when right mentally and physically is a special talent. And over the past month, Florida’s 23-year-old goaltender has been at the top of his game.

Knight on Saturday turned away all 34 shots he faced in the Panthers’ 3-0 victory over the Anaheim Ducks. What’s more, he was a quarter of an inch or so away from his first NHL goal. Knight’s empty-net attempt with the game firmly in hand clanged off the post. (Knight did get a point with an assist on Gustav Forsling’s seventh goal of the season a few moments later).

“Yeah I tried,” Knight said with a chuckle. “I’ll take the assist though.”

Knight’s shutout was the fifth of his career. He this season at the very least has proven he’s still a premium NHL backup. But that’s selling him short. Knight right now is the hottest goalie in a position group that includes a presumptive Hall of Famer.

Knight since Dec. 22 is 4-1 with 133 saves on 142 shots (.937 save percentage) with a 1.61 goals-against-average. Sergei Bobrovsky, meanwhile, is 2-5-1 with a .897 save percentage and a 3.05 GAA over that same stretch.

But don’t expect Paul Maurice to shake up his depth chart based on that relatively small sample size. The Panthers coach told reporters postgame that the goalie rotation was set months ago with the plan of keeping Bobrovsky sharp and healthy for the playoffs.

“We might move a few games around here here or there,” said Maurice, whose Cats head out for a four-game West Coast road trip at 27-17-3. “But both of those are going to play meaningful hockey and we’re gonna need both to be good based just on the sheer number of games.”

They’re also going to need more than five shifts from their leading scorer.

The Panthers couldn’t get out of their own way in the first period, playing shorthanded for more than 6 1/2 minutes thanks in large part to an unlucky kneeing game misconduct penalty assessed to Sam Reinhart three quarters of the way through the opening 20.

Reinhart tried to hip check Isac Lundestrom behind the Anaheim goal and missed, with his momentum carrying his knee into Lundestrom, which sent the Ducks center to the ice and ultimately the locker room.

But the Panthers got to the break tied at 0-0 thanks to Knight, who turned away all 11 shots he faced in the first period.

Knight stayed hot throughout the second period, with 14 more saves in the middle 20 -- including four in succession with the Ducks shorthanded. Anaheim couldn’t solve him or Florida’s defense. A well-placed stick by Mackie Samoskevich foiled what looked to be a certain point-blank goal on an empty net by ex-Panther Frank Vatrano.

On the other end of the ice, Josh Gibson and the Ducks defense was nearly as stingy. Gibson robbed Sam Bennett of his first goal in 20 games with a deft save, and had some puck luck a short time later when Matthew Tkachuk’s promising attempt smacked the post.

But the Panthers finally broke through, thanks again to the pleasantly surprising Jesper Boqvist, who beat Gibson for his career-best 11th goal of the season midway through the second. Tomas Nosek and Dmitry Kulikov both were credited with assists.

The Panthers’ second goal was unassisted. Anton Lundell literally did it all on his own. Roughly five minutes in into the third, stole the puck from Alex Killorn at center ice, made a move on defensemen Brian Dumoulin, and then beat Gibson stick-side on what frankly was a soft goal.

The goal was Lundell’s 11th on the season -- seven shy of his career high. Forsling rounded out the scoring with an open-netter with seven seconds remaining in regulation.