Comeback Denied: Vancouver Canucks 5, Florida Panthers 3

SUNRISE — The Florida Panthers came into the third Saturday night down a pair of goals to the visiting Canucks and, as the period went on, it looked like the Comeback Cats could be back.

Vancouver shut that down.

After Evan Rodrigues and Sam Reinhart combined for a pair of goals, Vancouver added two late and pulled out a 5-3 win.

Down 3-1, Reinhart was down low and kicked a rebound from Rodrigues onto his stick and beat Vancouver goalie Casey DeSmith.

Eight minutes later, Rodrigues sent a sharp backhanded pass from the backwall to the waiting stick of Reinhart who one-timed it past DeSmith to tie things at 3.

Florida ended up outshooting the Canucks 19-4 in the third — but, yet…

Andrei Kuzmenko scored with Sergei Bobrovsky down on the ice with 4:57 remaining giving Vancouver the lead back for good.

“We had an event on that game-winner that won’t happen again,’’ Paul Maurice said.

Until then, the story had been Vancouver’s power play as it had scored on its first two chances with the man advantage.

The Panthers came into the night ranked 24th in the NHL after giving up six goals on their first 20 penalty kills; Saturday, the Canucks got off 10 shots and scored off goals from Quinn Hughes and Carson Soucy.

Down 1-0, captain Sasha Barkov was along the blue line and took a pass from  Rodrigues and walked in toward DeSmith uncontested.

Although Barkov’s soft backhanded clipped the goal cage, Ian Cole’s clearing attempt helped push it through.

Vancouver would be the team to score quickly in the second.

Tied at 1, the Canucks took the lead back on their second power play chance — with former Vancouver d-man Oliver Ekman-Larsson in the box for hooking — as Soucy rifled a shot past Bobrovsky at 10:41.

A mere 36 seconds later, Vancouver made it 3-1 on an even-strength goal from Elias Pettersson.

The Panthers got within a goal at 6:10 of the third when Reinhart got his first.

Yet 17 seconds later, Vancouver got its third power play chance — after scoring twice with 10 shots on goal on the previous two.

This time, the Panthers shut them down and did not allow a shot.

Tied at 3, Vancouver retook the lead on a goal from Kuzmenko after Steven Lorentz collided with Bobrovsky and the two tumbled to the ice with 4:57 left.