Reinhart the hero, as Panthers top Leafs in OT for 3-0 lead

SUNRISE, Fla. — Sam Reinhart scored 3:02 into overtime and the Florida Panthers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 3-2 on Sunday night to take a commanding 3-0 lead in their Eastern Conference semifinal series.

Reinhart dumped the puck off the boards behind the net to set up his game-winner, taking a pass back from Anton Lundell and scoring to give Florida its first 3-0 series lead in 27 years.

Anthony Duclair and Carter Verhaeghe scored for Florida. Sam Lafferty and Erik Gustafsson scored for Toronto.

Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 22 shots for the Panthers. Joseph Woll stopped 18 of the 21 he faced for the Maple Leafs after he relieved starter Ilya Samsonov, who stopped all eight shots he saw before leaving early in the second period with an injury.

Game 4 is Wednesday night.

Reinhart’s goal for that 3-0 lead means it’s time for the Maple Leafs to spend the next three days hearing about the most dreaded of stats three games into a best-of-seven — the one about how only four clubs have erased such a deficit in hockey history. Toronto is one of those four, coming from 3-0 down to beat Detroit in the 1942 Cup title series.

Samsonov left the ice 37 seconds into the second period with an undisclosed injury. He was ruled out before the third period started.

The play started with Samsonov stopping a shot by Duclair, as Verhaeghe came down the slot chasing the rebound.

Verhaeghe got tripped by Toronto’s Luke Schenn, and Schenn also crashed into Samsonov on the same play. Samsonov remained down for more than a minute, eventually got to his feet and skated to the Toronto bench — going directly down the tunnel to the Maple Leafs’ locker room.

Woll replaced Samsonov, coming in cold to face the Florida power play. Woll stopped the first shot he faced, but Duclair scored with 1 second left on the power play to tie the game at 1-1.

Toronto led 1-0 and 2-1, only to see Florida come back with the tying goal each time.

Lafferty one-timed a pass from David Kampf home just 2:26 into the contest to finish off a 2-on-1 and open the scoring.

Duclair tied it on the power play shortly after Samsonov departed, only to see Toronto reclaim the lead when Gustafsson’s wrister caromed in off Marc Staal’s stick midway through the second. Verhaeghe tied it 5 minutes later and to the third they went, tied at 2-2.

DEVILS 8, HURRICANES 4: Jack Hughes scored two goals, set up two more, and had a near fight as New Jersey began the task of digging out of another hole with a rout over visiting Carolina in Game 3 of its Eastern Conference semifinals series.

Timo Meier, Nico Hischier and Damon Severson added their first goals of playoffs and Vitek Vanecek returned to the net, making 26 saves, and helping the Devils cut their deficit in the series to 2-1.

The eight goals were the most for New Jersey in a playoff game since the Devils beat Washington 10-4 on April 22, 1988.

The Hurricanes set an NHL record by scoring three short-handed goal in the game, which came from Jordan Martinook, Jordan Staal and Seth Jarvis.

Carolina goalie Frederik Andersen, who allowed two goals on 48 shots in the first two games of the series, gave up four on 12 shots before being replaced by Pyotr Kochetkov early in the second period.