"I thought we did a lot of good things, but in key moments we weren't making key decisions and key plays," Panthers interim head coach Andrew Brunette said. "It got caught up to us. I think we were kind of getting away with it throughout the game, and then it just slowly got to us."
Still sitting comfortably atop the Atlantic Division with an outstanding record of 35-11-5, the Panthers also saw their winning streak at home snapped at nine games with tonight's defeat.
"I liked a lot of things we did," Brunette said. "I thought we attacked, I thought we had energy and I thought we played the way we wanted to play. We just got a little loose in certain areas."
Opening up the scoring on the power play, Sam Reinhart carried the puck up from below the goal line and, recognizing that a defender had laid out to clog up the slot, tucked a shot that clanged off the far post and into the net to put the Panthers up 1-0 at 6:45 of the first period.
Tying up the game for the Predators later in the period, Filip Forsberg, after Sergei Bobrovsky had made more than a few consecutive acrobatic saves, jumped on a loose puck in the blue paint and jammed it past the sprawled-out goalie to even things up and make it 1-1 at 12:16.
Picking the perfect time to net his first goal of the season, Radko Gudas got the lead back for the Panthers just 1:54 into the second period when, after a faceoff win from Reinhart, he wired a point shot down the slot through a forest of legs and past David Rittich to make it a 2-1 contest.
Extending the lead further later in the middle frame, Aaron Ekblad, who had scored in each of his three previous games entering tonight's matchup, gloved a puck out of mid-air, skated into the offensive zone and beat Rittich with a far-side snipe to put the Panthers on top 3-1 at 9:42.
But within a span of 37 seconds, the Predators wiped the slate clean.
After Roman Josi buried a one-timer from beyond the right circle to trim Nashville's deficit to 3-2 at 10:44, Yakov Trenin shrugged off a defender and beat Bobrovsky with his backhand to make it a 3-3 game at 11:21 and set the stage for what proved to be a tight final 20 minutes of action.
"We get up 3-1 and we're trying to make plays in certain areas when we understood that it was going to be a hard kind of night and then we gave them back momentum," Brunette said. "It seems like every time we gained momentum, we gave it back. We got what deserved tonight."
Shifting momentum back in Florida's favor, Sam Bennett followed up on a shot from Jonathan Huberdeau and, taking advantage of chaos around the crease, jammed the ensuing rebound under Rittich and across the goal line to give the Panthers a 4-3 lead at 8:11 of the third period.
With two assists in tonight's game, Huberdeau overtook Edmonton's Connor McDavid and moved into first place on the NHL's scoring leaderboard with 72 points (17 goals, 55 assists).
Soon after, the Predators appeared to tie the game, but the goal came back after it was ruled that Bobrovsky was interfered with on the play.
The next one, however, did count.
Not deterred after having a goal taken off the board, Nashville tied the game for real when Tanner Jeannot pounced on a turnover and buried a shorthanded breakaway to suddenly make it 4-4 at 10:41.
"We knew they were a desperate team, and they showed it tonight," Bennett said of the push from the Predators. "We had chances to bury the game and really take control, and we let them back in. They pushed hard and battled hard, but we can't let them back in games that easy."
Giving the Predators their first lead of the game, Mikael Granlund scored on the power play to make it 5-4 at 14:29. After the Panthers pulled their goaltender for a 6-on-5 advantage, Jeannot then locked in the win for Nashville when he cashed in on the empty net to make it 6-4 at 18:28.
"We do want to win them all, and we feel like we can," Bennett said.
Looking to rebound, the Cats will continue their homestand against Columbus on Thursday.
Here are five takeaways from Tuesday's loss in Sunrise…
