Daniel Alfredsson scored the winning goal early in the third period and Brian Elliott made 20 saves for the Ottawa Senators, who beat the Florida Panthers 3-2 on Saturday night for their fourth straight victory.
Matt Cullen and Peter Regin also scored for the Senators. Erik Karlsson assisted on all of Ottawa's goals.
"We can match up against anybody, I think," Alfredsson said. "We know how close it is and how close a [playoff] series will be, but we feel that if we can continue here all the way to the playoffs, we can do some damage."
Stephen Weiss and Steven Reinprecht scored for the Panthers. Tomas Vokoun finished with 22 saves. Alfredsson scored his 20th of the season on the power play, firing a shot from just inside the blue-line in the opening minutes of the third that gave Ottawa a 3-1 lead. Alfredsson has scored at least 20 in 10 straight seasons.
The Panthers had two 5-on-3 power-play opportunities in the third period. Reinprecht beat Elliott on the first opportunity, but the Panthers failed to convert on the other. Elliott made a huge glove save on Nathan Horton to keep Florida at bay.
"We did a great job killing those [penalties] off," Elliott said. "Even if we get those penalties we're confident that we can kill them off."
Florida coach Peter DeBoer wasn't pleased with his team's effort.
"We're not getting anything," DeBoer said. "Whether it's a goalie pitching a shutout or a defenceman getting on the board or a forward scoring two or three, we're not finding a difference maker on any given night."
After a sluggish first period, both teams came out with a much better effort in the second.
The Panthers opened the scoring as Weiss sneaked a shot behind Elliott seven minutes into the period. Ottawa defenceman Anton Volchenkov was injured on the play after he collided with teammate Andy Sutton. Volchenkov left the game with an upper-body injury and did not return.
Head coach Cory Clouston said the injury doesn't appear to be serious.
Cullen tied it at 15:02, burying Karlsson's rebound over Vokoun.
Regin beat Vokoun through the legs at 17:40 to give Ottawa a 2-1 lead after two. Regin has three goals in four games.
