ST. PAUL, Minn. — Matthew Tkachuk scored twice, Sergei Bobrovsky made 26 saves and the Florida Panthers beat the Minnesota Wild 6-1 on Wednesday night.
Aaron Ekblad added his second goal of the season to go with two assists, and Mackie Samoskevich, Niko Mikkola and Eetu Luostarinen also scored for Florida. Tkachuk has 13 goals this season and has scored eight times in his past eight games.
Marco Rossi scored his 12th goal of the season for Minnesota. He has five goals in nine games since joining the top line with Kirill Kaprizov after Joel Eriksson Ek was injured.
Wild goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 27 shots while making his 1,004th career start, surpassing Patrick Roy for third all-time. Only Martin Brodeur (1,251 starts) and Roberto Luongo (1,014) have more.
Panthers: Florida was closer to being at full strength with Aleksander Barkov’s return after missing two games with an illness, but Sam Bennett missed the game with an illness. Barkov’s line with Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe generated plenty of pressure in the offensive zone.
Wild: Losses in four of six — and two in a row in regulation for the first time this season — have come with Minnesota dealing with its own short-handed squad. Goaltender Filip Gustavsson missed his second straight game with a lower-body injury. Eriksson Ek has missed seven games in a row with a lower-body injury. Defenseman Jake Middleton was out for the third straight game with an upper-body injury.
Tkachuk’s first goal with 4:32 remaining in the second came after Florida had a goal negated via replay for offside. He added his second goal 3:26 later after serving a roughing penalty.
The physical Panthers had a 37-21 edge in hits and lead the league in hits with 942.
The Panthers host St. Louis on Friday, while the Wild host Utah on the same night.
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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/NHL
