Colby Guy
The Florida Panthers took a big leap of faith by sending all-time leading scorer Jonathan Huberdeau and budding star defenseman MacKenzie Weegar to Calgary for Matthew Tkachuk in a blockbuster July trade.
It has paid off for them so far.
Through the first month of the season, Tkachuk leads the Panthers with five goals and 16 points in 11 games, which is good for sixth in the league.
Huberdeau, meanwhile, has just one goal and five points in nine games for a Flames team that currently finds itself on a three-game losing skid.
Last season, Florida relied on a speed-based transition game to generate offense — which worked great in the regular season to the tune of 340 goals.
The playoffs were a different story entirely.
And that is a big reason why Tkachuk is in Florida — and Huberdeau is not.
That speed-based element was largely helped by Huberdeau’s keen playmaking ability on the fly and was stunted by the Tampa Bay Lightning’s structured neutral zone defense in its sweep of the Panthers in the second round.
Tkachuk was brought in to carve through those types of defensive play with his strength, powerful skating and 6-foot-2, 200-pound frame.
So far, things are playing out exactly as Florida wanted them to.
Calgary underwent a lot of turnover offensively during the offseason — specifically with Tkachuk and fellow 100-point scorer Johnny Gaudreau both leaving — and have been relying on Huberdeau and fellow newcomer Nazem Kadri to pick up the slack.
The speed of the Flames’ offense last year predicated a lot on Gaudreau’s fast-paced playmaking ability and they are trying to emulate that through Huberdeau this season.
It has not quite worked out so far.
Huberdeau’s game has slowed down since his arrival in Cowtown and it has marred the Flames as of late.
The former 115-point scorer has not registered a single point since Calgary started its three-game losing streak on Oct. 29.
“Jonathan has to speed his game up, that’s for sure,” Flames coach Darryl Sutter said per Calgary Hockey Now.
“I think players like that that are cerebral guys, the way they see the game — you’ve got to do it moving. Sometimes you can paralyze yourself.”
That hesitation to his game was present throughout the Panthers’ 2022 playoff run — where he had just five points in 10 games and helped run a 1-for-31 power play — and it has not seemed to go away just yet.
“I’ve still got a lot of work to do. It hasn’t been easy for me the beginning of the year,” Huberdeau said.
“I think (Sutter is) right. Thinking a little bit too much out there and not moving my feet as I used to last year. I’ve got to start doing that. I want to do it as soon as possible. I’ve just got to relax.”
Meanwhile, Tkachuk’s success in Florida is arguably in spite of the team’s pace of play.
The Panthers’ once-potent offense has sputtered out of the gate, starting the season 20th in goals-for-per-game (3.0) and with the league’s second-worst power play (10.6 percent), yet Tkachuk still is Top 10 in scoring.
The 24-year-old power forward has gotten his points by willing his way through opponents and fighting for rebounds in front of the net.
His strength combined with his unique ability to make plays with such little space around him makes him hard to stop even when things are not going right around him.
That was why Panthers general manager Bill Zito rushed to the phone to try and land him when he unexpectedly became available in July.
”He is real good right hashmarks down in the offensive zone,” Paul Maurice said.
“He has hand skill and with the way he positions his body, he is clearly not afraid to hang it out down there. He has a little edge when he bumps into people, we just have to have a little rangefinder going with some of those shots and he will do well.”
While it is still too early to tell whether the Panthers won this trade — nor may there ever truly be a ‘winner’ — and Huberdeau is certainly a great enough player to break out of this slump, Florida still has many reasons to be happy with the trade.
They got younger, they wedged themselves out of an otherwise lengthy salary cap dilemma and they got the player they needed to compete in slower-paced games.