Florida Panthers Have Bobrovsky, Samoskevich Back v. Sharks

FORT LAUDERDALE — The Florida Panthers have two key players back on the ice Saturday night when they welcome the San Jose Sharks to Sunrise.

First, Sergei Bobrovsky will be back in net after he stayed behind on the recent road trip as he and wife Olga welcomed a second child to their family.

Mackie Samoskevich also is back after a quick trip to Charlotte to practice with his pals on the Checkers.

Samoskevich had to miss the two games along with Bobrovsky so the Panthers could call up Chris Driedger to backup Spencer Knight and stay salary cap compliant.

The Panthers are excited to have their guy Bob back.

“We trust both our goalies,” Aaron Ekblad said, “and Bob is an outstanding goaltender. With him backstopping us, we won a championship. So, there is a ton of confidence there. Love the way his game has continued to evolve. He has played a long time, and gets better every year. It is fun to watch.’’

Added Paul Maurice: “His preparation is off the charts. His love of the game is infectious. … And, he’s a new dad so everyone is happy for him today. Everyone is jacked up for him.’’

Tonight’s game is a quick stop home for the Panthers who will hit the road Monday to kick off a five-game western swing starting with Tuesday’s game against Brandon Montour and the Seattle Kraken.

The Panthers would certainly like to head west with their point streak intact.

Florida has points in its past five games (4-0-1) and should get a motivated Sharks team which was humbled in an 8-1 loss to the Lightning on Thursday.

San Jose, which finished last in the standings last season, are improved and had won three straight before being thumped by the Bolts.

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For San Jose coach Ryan Warsofsky, Thursday’s implosion was not a game to simply dismiss.

Although Maurice talked about having a handful of those kind of head-scratchers that teams go through, the Sharks are a young team and need to learn from everything they experience.

Playing the Panthers will be part of their continuing education.

“We get back to work. We practice, we show the video of things that we know are not acceptable,” Warsofsky said Saturday morning. “We practice how to be competitive again. It is not a throwaway game, at all. We need to learn from it. We got a case of reality of what it really means to compete in this league against a really good team. We’ll get another chance tonight to correct it and get back to being competitive.” 

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— The starting goalies: Bobrovsky goes against Mackenzie Blackwood tonight.

— Florida will have Uvis Balinskis return to the lineup in place of Adam Boqvist.

— When it comes to NHL Betting, the Panthers are heavy favorites tonight against the Sharks with the local book having Florida -400 on the money line.

— With Florida’s power play clicking on all cylinders, Maurice said he would keep Carter Verhaeghe on the top unit with Samoskevich getting time on the second set.

The Panthers have scored on 10 of their past 19 power-play chances and are up to third (28.4 percent) in the NHL this season.

— The Panthers are holding their annual ‘Toys for Tots’ Toy Drive on the arena plaza starting today at 4 through 6:30.

Fans are encouraged to bring new and unwrapped toys to benefit families in need this holiday season.

ON DECK: GAME 28

SAN JOSE SHARKS AT FLORIDA PANTHERS

• When: Saturday, 6 p.m.
• Where: Amerant Bank Arena, Sunrise
• Local TV: Scripps Sports — WSFL 39 (Miami/FtL); WHDT 9 (WPB); LAFF 36.3 (SWFla)
• Streaming: Panthers+, ESPN+
• Radio: WPOW 96.5-FM2; WBZT 1230-AM (Palm Beach); WCTH 100.3-FM (Florida Keys); SiriusXM
• Panthers Radio Streaming: SiriusXM 932, NHL App
• Betting Odds — Panthers Favored: Money Line (-400); Puck line (-2.5, +115); Over/Under 6.5 (+100/-120)
• Last Season: Florida won 2-0
  
• This Season — At Florida: Saturday. At San Jose: Jan. 25.
• All-time Regular Season Series: Florida leads 23-13-1, 7 ties
• Up Next for the Panthers: Tuesday at Seattle Kraken, 10 p.m.

PROJECTED FLORIDA PANTHERS (16-9-2) LINES

23 Carter Verhaeghe // 16 Sasha Barkov // 13 Sam Reinhart

70 Jesper Boqvist // 9 Sam Bennett // 19 Matthew Tkachuk

27 Eetu Luostarinen // 15 Anton Lundell // 17 Evan Rodrigues

10 AJ Greer // 94 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, Jonah Gadjovich

Reassigned to Charlotte: Chris Driedger

PROJECTED SAN JOSE SHARKS (10-14-5) LINES

72 William Eklund // 71 Macklin Celebrini // 20 Fabian Zetterlund

11 Luke Kunin // 21 Alexander Wennberg // 73 Tyler Toffoli

10 Klim Kostin // 64 Mikael Granlund // 56 Ethan Cardwell

91 Carl Grundstrom // 7 Nico Sturm // 53 Ty Dellandrea

96 Jake Walman // 4 Cody Ceci

38 Mario Ferraro // 37 Timothy Liljegren

3 Henry Thrun // 84 Jan Rutta

29 Mackenzie Blackwood

41 Vitek Vanecek

Scratched: Givani Smith, Jack Thompson

Injured: Logan Couture (groin), Marc-Edouard Vlasic (upper body), Barclay Goodrow (upper body), Will Smith (upper body)