Panthers Set an NHL Record With Natural Hat Tricks in Three Straight Games

The Florida Panthers set an NHL record on Saturday, October 17, that no team in league history had managed: a natural hat trick in three consecutive games. Carter Verhaeghe scored three straight goals in an 8-3 win over the Seattle Kraken to complete a streak Brady Tkachuk had started earlier in the week, and Sam Bennett added a regular hat trick in the same game for good measure.

What is a natural hat trick, and why is this streak a record?

A natural hat trick is three consecutive goals by one player, uninterrupted by a team mate or an opponent, a stricter feat than the ordinary three goal game explained in our guide to what a hat trick in hockey means. One natural hat trick is a good week. Three in three games, by one team, had never happened in the NHL before Saturday, according to Reuters and USA Today. The streak also contains a personal first inside the team first: Tkachuk’s two natural hat tricks in consecutive games had never been done by a single player either, Daily Faceoff reports.

How did the three games unfold?

Tkachuk opened the run on Tuesday, October 13, scoring three straight goals in the second period of a 7-3 win over Columbus, with his brother Matthew assisting on all three, Daily Faceoff reports. On Thursday he did it again in a 3-2 overtime win over Vancouver. On Saturday against Seattle, Tkachuk was held without a goal, and Verhaeghe took the streak over instead. After Bennett and Seattle’s Shane Wright traded early goals, Verhaeghe scored at 17:56 and 19:07 of the first period, then completed his natural hat trick at 6:02 of the second, Reuters reports. “You can thank Brady for that,” Verhaeghe said after the game, in USA Today’s account.

What else happened on the record night?

Bennett scored a hat trick of his own in the same game, the first time in Panthers history that two players have done it on one night, and his third goal brought up his 400th career point. The Hockey News counts four Florida hat tricks across the three games, matching the total the franchise managed across the previous three regular seasons combined. The one concern came from the win itself: Matthew Tkachuk left the game early after a collision with Bennett. Coach Paul Maurice said the decision was precautionary, and USA Today reports Maurice expects him to be fine while the team monitors him.

Why is the timing of Tkachuk’s surge its own story?

Because a month ago there was nothing to build a streak from. Brady Tkachuk arrived from Ottawa in an offseason trade and recorded no points in his first five games as a Panther, then one assist in his sixth, USA Today reports. Florida moved him onto a line with Matthew and Bennett while captain Aleksander Barkov and Brad Marchand missed time, and he has 10 points in his last four games. Records usually belong to settled teams playing settled lines. This one belongs to a reshuffled line on a team missing its captain, in a month that has already produced first of their kind nights like Montreal’s three disallowed goals in one game.

Where does the record sit in NHL history?

Deep in it. Daily Faceoff reports Florida is the first team in more than 100 years to record four or more hat tricks before its 10th game of a season, and Sports Illustrated, citing the NHL, adds that the Panthers are only the second team in 105 years with four or more hat tricks across a span of three games or fewer. The comparison point is the 1922-23 Toronto St. Patricks, a team from the league’s earliest era. Early season records are falling at both ends of the standings this month, from Florida’s scoring run to the Flyers’ worst start in franchise history, in the same weeks that Alex Ovechkin’s final season has turned Washington’s home games into milestone nights.

Can the streak reach four games?

It can, on Wednesday, October 21, in Ottawa, and the venue gives the attempt a script no schedule maker would dare to write. The game is Brady Tkachuk’s first return to Ottawa since the trade that sent the former Senators captain to Florida, USA Today reports. He started this record there in spirit, as the player Senators fans watched for years, and a fourth straight natural hat trick, by him or by anyone in a Panthers shirt, would extend a record that stood untouched for the league’s entire history until Saturday.