Florida Panthers
Could the Florida Panthers Have Started Any Better? Nope
SUNRISE — There were questions about the Florida Panthers coming into this new season, sure.
Yeah, they knew Matthew Tkachuk would be out for a while. Tomas Nosek, their fourth-line center as well.
But when captain Sasha Barkov went down — their three-time Selke Trophy winner — with a major knee injury, well, that was it for the championship Panthers at least for this season.
Right?
Perhaps.
Just not yet.
Or, simply, not.
On Saturday night, the woe-is-us? Panthers kept rolling with a dominant 6-2 win over the Ottawa Senators.
Say what you will about the Panthers moving forward, but Ottawa is certainly one of the up-and-coming teams not only in the Atlantic Division, but in the NHL.
And the Panthers roasted them.
Florida jumped out to a 2-0 lead, led 4-1 after 40 minutes and kept the trains moving with yet another nice win to start their Threepeat* (we owe ya, Pat Riley) season going.
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Pick the Panthers’ opponents apart if you want to, but Florida has beaten Chicago, Philadelphia, and now Ottawa by a combined 11-5.
The power play has gone 5-12 in the opening three games, the penalty kill 7-for-7.
Of the 11 goals scored, nine have been by different players.
Only Brad Marchand and Anton Lundell have scored twice.
The Panthers, aside from Saturday’s six-goal onslaught, have been grinding out wins.
Just the way they like it.
“We’re a well-oiled machine,’’ said Aaron Ekblad, who got his first of the season on Saturday. “We feel good about our game to start. Obviously, we have a set of rules that we try to adhere to on a daily basis and try to bring to our game every day.”
The Panthers, obviously, have a long way to go and without Barkov and Tkachuk, it could be an uphill climb.
But this is a solid team from top to bottom, and winning games is all that matters.
In fact, the Panthers are just the third team in the past 25 years to kick off a Stanley Cup defense with wins in their firs three games.
Will this run continue?
Perhaps.
Right now though, the Panthers look pretty, pretty, pretty good.
“We have so much confidence in every single one of these guys,’’ said Mackie Samoskevich, who has slid into a third line with Jesper Boqvist and Evan Rodrigues that seems to make something happen every time it is on the ice.
“We learned so much from last year, we basically have the same team, so it’s obviously nice to have that. [There was] so much we learned from last year that I think we just kind of know what to do.”
The Panthers now hit the road for the next five, but they seem excited for the chance to get away.
Florida was one of the NHL’s best road teams last year, and that only was exemplified in the playoffs.
The Panthers have a defensive-first game that, as Ekblad likes to say, “travels well.’’
Florida may be the tw0-time defending Stanley Cup champion, but they are not going to get all fancy on you.
They play the way they want when and where they want.
“It’s a good start,” said Sergei Bobrovsky, who is 3-0 and has allowed six goals in three games.
“We have played good games with our structure. Good wins, good points.’’
ON DECK: GAME 4
FLORIDA PANTHERS at PHILADELPHIA FLYERS
- When: Monday, 7 p.m.
- Where: Xfinity Center, Philadelphia
- Local TV: Scripps Sports — WSFL 39 (Miami/FTL); WPTV 5/WHDT 9 (WPB); LAFF 36.3 (SWFla)
- Streaming: Panthers+; ESPN+
- Radio: WQAM 560-AM; WBZT 1230-AM (West Palm Beach); WCTH 100.3-FM (Florida Keys); WCZR 101.7-FM (Treasure Coast); SiriusXM
- Panthers Radio Streaming: SiriusXM 932, NHL/Panthers App
- Last Season: Florida won 2-1
- This Season (Panthers Lead 1-0) — At Florida: Panthers 2, Flyers 1 (Oct. 9); Nov. 26; At Philadelphia: Oct 13.
- All-time Regular Season Series: Philadelphia leads 60-40-7, 7 ties
- Up Next for the Panthers: Wednesday at Detroit Red Wings, 7 (Local TV)
