Panthers top Wings as Jagr records milestone

SUNRISE, Fla.-- The goals keep coming for the Florida Panthers, and so do the victories.
Jaromir Jagr had a goal and two assists, Vincent Trocheck had two goals and an assist and the Panthers defeated the Detroit Red Wings 6-3 at BB&T Center on Thursday.

The Panthers (31-15-5) have won five in a row and are 23-6-1 in their past 30 games.
Florida has scored five or more goals in each of its past four games, the first time in franchise history the team has done it four consecutive times.
"The offense has been coming together," Trocheck said. "We have a really deep team. All four lines can score goals. It's the kind of thing where every night you have different guys producing and stepping up. We just play our team game and we know we're at the point where we know if we play our game, we're going to score goals, we're going to be able to win games if we work our hardest."
Jagr's first assist was the 1,100 of his career. He became the sixth player in NHL history to reach that plateau, joining Wayne Gretzky, Ron Francis, Mark Messier, Ray Bourque and Paul Coffey.
The goal was Jagr's first since Jan. 10, ending an eight-game drought. The goal at 3:45 of the third period that made it 5-2 was the 738th of Jagr's career; he is now three behind Brett Hull for third place on the NHL's all-time list.
Jagr didn't play in the final 12:27 of the Panthers' 5-2 victory against the Washington Capitals on Tuesday after sustaining a minor injury.
"He came in and had a big first period," Panthers coach Gerard Gallant said. "He made some real good plays. And then he scored that goal on the power play. That was a huge goal for us. (Jagr) played really well."

Brandon Pirri had a goal and an assist, Aleksander Barkov and Derek MacKenzie scored, and Reilly Smith and Jussi Jokinen each had two assists for the Panthers.
Pirri was back in the lineup after being a healthy scratch in Florida's previous four games.
"You never want to be scratched, but the team was winning," Pirri said. "So there's a silver lining in that. But at the same time I wanted to come back here and help the team any way I could. It was nice to produce."
Jagr and Barkov scored on the power play, Florida's third consecutive game scoring two goals with a man advantage.
Roberto Luongo made 36 saves, extended his franchise-record home winning streak to eight games and moved into sole possession of seventh place on the NHL's all-time wins list with 424, breaking a tie with Tony Esposito.
Luongo was particularly impressive in the first period when he stopped 17 of 18 shots.
"There were a lot of chances and (Luongo) had to be outstanding in that first period for sure," Gallant said. "It could have been very easily 4-4 that first period, very easily. Detroit is a fast team and it was a good-skating game. I'm sure it was really entertaining, but there were a lot of opportunities."
Red Wings rookie forward Dylan Larkin had two goals for Detroit, which lost back-to-back games in the state of Florida. Detroit lost 3-1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Wednesday. Defenseman Mike Green had the other goal.
Jimmy Howard, making only his third start in 14 games since being pulled in back-to-back games, made 27 saves.
"Another tough night for him," Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill said. "Puck luck wasn't going his way. He battled. He's got to continue to stay mentally tough."
Florida extended its lead atop the Atlantic Division to seven points over idle Tampa Bay. Detroit (25-18-8) dropped to nine points behind.
The Panthers have won both meetings this season, the first a 2-1 overtime win at Joe Louis Arena on Nov. 29. The teams will meet again in Detroit on Monday.
The Red Wings came out firing Thursday, outshooting the Panthers 7-0 in the first five minutes.

Pirri, who didn't have a goal in his previous six games before being scratched, opened the scoring at 8:30 of the first period when he deflected Alex Petrovic's shot from the point.
"I got high-sticked before, so my visor was (so) I couldn't see anything and I was just trying to get in front," Pirri said. "Playing with (Barkov) and (Jagr), you don't really know what they're going to do anyway, so you just try to create some traffic in front and luckily I got a piece of it."
Barkov and Trocheck scored twice in a span of 25 seconds midway through the period to extend the lead to 3-0.
After scoring with six seconds left in the first period, Larkin scored again 1:01 into the second when he beat Luongo to the far side with a wrist shot from the left circle.
"We made it 3-2 there, it was close at times, we had a few chances," Larkin said. "Give credit to them, they're resilient and found a way to win."
Pirri helped the Panthers restore a two-goal lead when he spun around to fire a pass in front of the net. Howard deflected the puck forward, but it went off of the body of MacKenzie, who was credited with the goal at 16:13. The goal was confirmed after video review to make sure it was a legal deflection and the Red Wings then unsuccessfully challenged the goal, claiming goalie interference.
"I had a good vantage point of it," Howard said. "I knew it was probably going to be a good goal. I was just trying to deflect it away from him and got into his body and deflected into the net."
Green made it 5-3 at 12:36 of the third period with a power-play goal after the Red Wings had pulled Howard in favor of an extra attacker.
Trocheck scored an empty-net goal with 5:24 remaining.
"In the end, I was happy with the way our guys continued to battle back, the effort, the character," Blashill said. "We gave up two power-play goals; that's a tough thing on the road. From a process standpoint I was happy with a lot of areas. It might sound funny to fans when you lose 6-3."