Barkov delivers 4-point game in loss

CALGARY, ALBERTA — Calgary Flames captain Mark Giordano was pleased with the way teammate Matthew Tkachuk delivered in the clutch.

Tkachuk scored twice in regulation and again in the shootout as the Flames recovered from squandering three leads and beat the Florida Panthers 6-5 on Thursday night.

“In big games, [Tkachuk] is always going to be there,” Giordano said. “You always want the puck on his stick, it seems, in high-pressure situations. He makes plays under pressure. That’s what makes him so good.”

However, Tkachuk wasn’t pleased the way his team blew three leads.

“We’re lucky. That’s obviously a big two points, but we don’t want to get comfortable in games like that,” Tkachuk said. “We’ve got a two-goal lead in the third you have to put it away.”

Sean Monahan also scored in the with shootout for Calgary, which converted both tiebreaking attempts on Sergei Bobrovsky. David Rittich thwarted Jonathan Huberdeau and Aleksander Barkov to secure the victory.

Austin Czarnik, Mark Giordano and Sam Bennett scored in regulation for Calgary.

Huberdeau, MacKenzie Weegar, Josh Brown, Evgenii Dadonov and Mark Pysyk scored for Florida. Barkov had four assists.

Florida got its first lead at 14:59 of the third period. Pysyk got open in the slot, took a feed from Frank Vatrano and sent a 30-foot wrist shot through Rittich’s pads.

Calgary responded at 17:17. Bennett broke to the net, shot the puck and collected his own rebound to score.

“We got a big goal there, obviously, all of a sudden it’s 5-4 (Florida) but then they get a fortunate bounce on their goal,” Panthers coach Joel Quenneville said. “Then in overtime, anything can happen and we’ve been snake-bit a little bit in overtime and in the shootout.”