Sharks vs. Panthers: Luca Cagnoni's First NHL Goal Wins It in Overtime After Florida Erases a 3-0 Lead

Every hockey kid has narrated this exact moment in a driveway somewhere. Overtime, the puck slides across, the shot goes in, the crowd loses it. Luca Cagnoni got to skip the narration on Thursday night. He just did it.

Will Smith carried the puck into the zone 3:14 into overtime and fed it across to Cagnoni at the left circle, and the 21-year-old defenseman beat Akira Schmid through the five-hole to give the San Jose Sharks a 4-3 win over the Florida Panthers in their season opener at SAP Center. It was Cagnoni's first NHL goal, in his 10th game, and it rescued a night on which the Sharks had watched a 3-0 lead evaporate.

"Pretty unreal. Probably the best goal of my life," Cagnoni said. "Hard to write one better than an overtime winner."

Fast, Loud and Occasionally Punchy

This one had a pulse from the opening faceoff. Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky called it "the fastest game that I've probably seen coaching this team," and the two teams spent a good chunk of it trying to run through each other. Florida finished with 41 hits. Brady Tkachuk and Jacob Trouba dropped the gloves at 7:40 of the first, and Collin Graf and Uvis Balinskis followed suit in the second.

Mason Marchment, playing his first game for San Jose after signing with the Sharks on July 1, opened the scoring at 14:20 of the first. He collected the puck on the right wall, curled above the circle and snuck a wrist shot through traffic and under Schmid. A debut goal in front of a home crowd that, by Macklin Celebrini's account, was bringing it all night.

"The fans brought the energy," Celebrini said.

The second period was where San Jose looked ready to run away with it. After Smith's shorthanded goal (more on that below), Sam Bennett went to the box for hooking at 9:50, and the Sharks cashed in at 10:37. Celebrini tried a wraparound that Schmid stopped with a diving stick, but Smith was right there to poke the loose puck over the line. Three goals, zero for Florida, and the building was rocking.

The Turning Point: A Four-Minute Gift That Backfired

Rewind to early in the second, when Florida had a golden chance to tie it. Kiefer Sherwood was whistled for a double minor for high-sticking Aleksander Barkov at 1:55, giving the Panthers four full minutes with the extra man down 1-0. Instead of tying the game, they gave one up.

Celebrini stripped Matthew Tkachuk, broke out on a 2-on-1 and slid it to Smith, who snapped a wrist shot over Schmid's blocker from the right circle at 5:52. A potential equalizer turned into a two-goal hole.

"I trusted (Celebrini) to make the wall play and then he kind of took off with it, and I think they were a little bit gassed at the end of a power play, so we got a little bit of a break," Smith said.

The night got worse for Florida soon after. Barkov went down awkwardly battling for a puck in the corner during a Panthers power play and left at 8:07 of the second, tossing his gloves down on his way to the dressing room. The 31-year-old captain was playing just his second game of the season after missing all of 2025-26 with a knee injury suffered on the first day of training camp. Panthers coach Paul Maurice offered some hope afterward. "He'll get looked at tomorrow," Maurice said. "It's not related to his injury last year at all."

Florida Does Florida Things

Down 3-0, the Panthers did what they do: they kept coming. Darnell Nurse's cross-check at 15:44 put Florida on the power play, and Eetu Luostarinen swept a backhand in off the post at 17:10 after Aaron Ekblad's point shot caromed off Yaroslav Askarov's blocker.

Then came the third-period blitz. At 5:01, Dmitry Kulikov's point shot hit Luostarinen and deflected in off Cagnoni, a bit of cosmic foreshadowing for the kid. Just 17 seconds later, Bennett stole the puck from Michael Misa along the left wall and flipped a backhand pass to Tkachuk, who ripped one off the post and past Askarov's glove. Tie game, 3-3.

"I think we pushed harder in the third and we got some results," Luostarinen said.

Celebrini was honest about the dip. "I think we started a little flat there in the third," he said. "We knew they were going to come on and push, so I think we did a good job weathering it." San Jose held on the rest of the way to reach overtime, and Smith and Cagnoni handled the rest.

Star Watch

Will Smith: Two goals, one shorthanded and one on the power play, plus the primary assist on the overtime winner. Three points, plus-2, 20:09 of ice time.

Macklin Celebrini: Three assists in 22:57, including the takeaway that started the shorthanded goal.

Luca Cagnoni: A goal, an assist and three blocked shots in 21:17. He also took an interference penalty, but nobody will remember that part.

Eetu Luostarinen: Two goals for Florida, both from the dirty areas, to drive the comeback.

Matthew Tkachuk: The tying goal in 22:47, with Bennett doing the dirty work on the steal.

The goalies: Askarov made 23 saves on 26 shots. Schmid made 28 saves on 32 shots in his Florida debut.

Stats That Matter

• 1 for 6: Florida's power play, which also gave up a shorthanded goal. San Jose went 1 for 4.
• 17 seconds: The gap between Luostarinen's second goal and Tkachuk's equalizer.
• 41-24: Florida's edge in hits.
• 32-26: San Jose's advantage in shots on goal.
• 21-12: San Jose's edge in blocked shots.

What It Means

San Jose starts 1-0-0 and gets right back to work against Los Angeles at home on Saturday night. There was even a bonus storyline: Ivar Stenberg, the No. 2 pick in the 2026 NHL Draft, logged 13:35 in his NHL debut.

Florida drops to 1-0-1 with three points after opening the season with a 1-0 overtime win at Carolina on Tuesday. The bigger concern is health. Beyond Barkov, defenseman Gustav Forsling was a late scratch with an upper-body injury, though Maurice said he expects Forsling to play Sunday when the Panthers visit Anaheim.

Closing Take

Cagnoni admitted this was not the first time he had scored this goal, at least in his imagination. "People dream of playing (in the NHL) and stuff like that," he said. "I feel like I reenacted that a couple times, but (it's an) unreal feeling." Turns out the dress rehearsals paid off. Opening night, overtime, first career goal: some scripts write themselves.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Game details from the Associated Press; postgame quotes and notes as reported by NHL.com.