While the Florida Panthers forwards couldn’t find a way to beat Marc-Andre Fleury, the club’s defensemen had no such trouble, scoring three times to lead the Cats to a 5-2 win over the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center.
Aaron Ekblad opened the scoring, from Sam Reinhart and Mason Marchment, 16:33 into the first period by bashing in Reinhart’s cross from the left circle. Brandon Montour took a drop pass from Aleksander Barkov and blew a shot by Fleury 7:26 into the second to snap a 1-1 tie, and MacKenzie Weegar scored the eventual game-winning goal off a centering feed from Carter Verhaeghe.