Florida Panthers at Full Strength Against Dallas Stars in Finland

The Florida Panthers will be at full strength for the first time this season when they play the Dallas Stars today at 2 p.m. ET in Tampere, Finland.

The Panthers activated Tomas Nosek off long-term injured reserve prior to today’s game and he will center the fourth line as he was expected to do when signed as a free agent on July 1.

Nosek has been out since being injured on his second shift of the preseason Sept. 22 against the Nashville Predators.

He was tripped up while crashing the net and was sent into the boards.

With the Panthers down both Matthew Tkachuk and Sasha Barkov, the team had no choice but to put him on LTIR to add rookie Patrick Giles to the roster.

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To qualify to be activated off LTIR, a player must miss 10 games and 24 days; Nosek certainly met those requirements.

Giles was returned to AHL Charlotte as the corresponding roster move.

“Really excited and credit Uvis Balinskis who came up and played forward for us when we were shorthanded,” coach Paul Maurice said. “The idea originally was Greer, Nosek, and Boqvist; I’m looking forward to it. It changes how I can run the bench.”

The starting goalies: Sergei Bobrovsky and Jake Oettinger.

— The Panthers, who came to the rink wearing custom robes as if they were hanging out at a sauna, have Finnish native Anton Lundell as an alternate captain for the first time. Lundell takes Ekblad’s spot.

— Florida started all four of its Finnish players today with the Panthers kicking things off with Lundell, Sasha Barkov, and Eetu Luostarinen as their top line. Niko Mikkola started with Swede Gus Forsling.

• Video of the Panthers in Helsinki and Tampere, including Barkov and his Finnish teammates answering questions from the local media, is on the FHN YouTube Channel.

ON DECK: GAME 12 

NHL GLOBAL SERIES AT TAMPERE, FINLAND

FLORIDA PANTHERS V. DALLAS STARS

• When: Friday, 2 p.m. ET
• Where: Nokia Arena; Tampere, Finland
• Local TV: Scripps Sports — WSFL 39 (Miami/FTL); WHDT 9 (WPB); LAFF 36.3 (Naples/FTM)
• National TV: NHLN
• Streaming: Panthers+
• Radio: WPOW 96.5-FM2; WBZT 1230-AM (Palm Beach); WCTH 100.3-FM (Florida Keys); SiriusXM
• Panthers Radio Streaming: SiriusXM 932, NHL App
• App
• Betting Odds — Panthers Favored: Money Line (-120); Puck line (-1.5, +185); Over/Under 6 (-110/-110)
• Last Season: Florida won 2-0
• This Season — At Tampere, Finland: Friday, Saturday.
• All-time Regular Season Series: Florida leads 26-21-2, 3 ties
• Up Next for the Panthers: Saturday vs. Dallas Stars, noon ET

PROJECTED FLORIDA PANTHERS (7-3-1) LINES

17 Evan Rodrigues // 16 Sasha Barkov // 13 Sam Reinhart

23 Carter Verhaeghe// 9 Sam Bennett // 19 Matthew Tkachuk

13 Eetu Luostarinen // 15 Anton Lundell // 70 Jesper Boqvist

10 AJ Greer // 92 Tomas Nosek // 25 Mackie Samoskevich

42 Gus Forsling // 5 Aaron Ekblad

77 Niko Mikkola // 7 Dmitry Kulikov

88 Nate Schmidt // 26 Uvis Balinskis

72 Sergei Bobrovsky

30 Spencer Knight

Scratched: Adam Boqvist, Chris Driedger

Injured: Jonah Gadjovich (back), Justin Sourdif (UBI)

PROJECTED DALLAS STARS (7-2-0) LINES

14 Jamie Benn // 24 Roope Hintz // 11 Logan Stankoven

21 Jason Robertson // 53 Wyatt Johnston // 63 Evgenii Dadonov

27 Mason Marchment // 95 Matt Duchene // 91 Tyler Seguin

18 Sam Steel // 22 Mavrik Bourque // 15 Colin Blackwell

4 Miro Heiskanen // 3 Mathew Dumba

55 Thomas Harley // 46 Ilya Lyubushkin

23 Esa Lindell // 5 Nils Lundkvist

29 Jake Oettinger

1 Casey DeSmith

Scratched: Oskar Back, Brendan Smith, Kyle Capobianco, Magnus Hellberg

Injured: None

Dallas Stars lines provided by NHL.com