FLORIDA PANTHERS VS OTTAWA SENATORS 01/02/2020 LIVE 7:30 PM ET

After his team lost the first game of a four-game road trip on Tuesday night at Columbus, Florida coach Joel Quenneville had one simple instruction for his Panthers heading into Thursday night's game at Ottawa.

"Move forward," Quenneville said after the 4-1 loss to the Blue Jackets.

The defeat was the second in seven games for the Panthers, who are just one point behind third-place Tampa Bay in the Atlantic Division. Florida will finish the trip at Buffalo on Saturday and Pittsburgh on Sunday.

"We've won some games there," Quenneville said. "Maybe we were fortunate, but at the same time there's a lot of positives exiting this game. Let's go think about it one game at a time on the rest of this trip and let's recapture some momentum here."

The loss at Columbus was an emotional one for Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky, who stopped 24 of 28 shots. It was the first game back at Nationwide Arena for the 2013 and 2017 Vezina Trophy winner, who played seven seasons with the Blue Jackets before signing a seven-year, $70 million contract with Florida last July.

"I hate to lose," Bobrovsky said. "It is what it is. I think I have to be better. Four goals, that's a lot."

Bobrovsky received a special video tribute and standing ovation from the fans during the first period.

"All the emotions are weird," Bobrovsky said. "It's tough to describe to be on the other side of the bench here. It's different. It was lots of memories. Went to my old apartment last night. Cried a couple times there. So, it's tough. Seven years, it's a lot."

Ottawa, an impressive 11-5-2 at home, comes in off a 5-2 loss at Pittsburgh on Monday. Evgeni Malkin scored two goals as the Penguins built a 3-1 lead early in the second period. After Nick Paul cut it to 3-2 with his second goal of the game and third in two games, Pittsburgh answered with goals by Patric Hornqvist and Jake Guentzel to pull away.

"Just too many mistakes in our end," Senators coach D.J. Smith said. "Gave up a two-on-one right at the start of the game and their good players beat us. We didn't quit. We never do. But we were unable to contain their top guys defensively in our zone and off the rush. Malkin just kind of ate us up tonight."

"We have to get back to playing a full 60 minutes hard," Paul said. "We can't take any letups. Just tighten up our game. Our neutral zone is usually our best part of our game. We're letting up too many odd-man rushes. I think we just have to tighten up, play hard, and get back to the way we were."

This is the second meeting between the teams this season. Florida, powered by Noel Acciari's first career hat trick and Jonathan Huberdeau's four assists, scored five second-period goals in a 6-1 victory over the Senators on Dec. 16 in Sunrise, Fla.