George Richards, FHN Publisher
For years, Florida Panthers center Sasha Barkov was the runaway winner for the ‘most underrated player in the NHL’ award.
Those days appear to be over.
While Barkov may not be the poster boy for the National Hockey League, the Florida captain has become synonymous with his team’s success.
As the Panthers open their first-round playoff series against the Lightning on Sunday night, Barkov will be in the spotlight.
Barkov finished his best season — yes, even better than two years ago when he racked up a franchise-record 96 points — of his career in leading Florida to a 37-14-5 record and second place in the Central Division.
“To have a superstar like that,” Keith Yandle said, “a guy who can drive the bus for our team is really amazing.”
With 26 goals and 58 points, Barkov is considered the favorite to win the Selke Award which goes to “the forward who best excels in the defensive aspects of the game.”
Few forwards in the league do as much on both ends of the ice as Barkov.
“He’s had a tremendous year,” Joel Quenneville said. “I think Barky represents being a 200-foot player more than anybody in the game. His speed at both sides, both ways, he’s exemplified that consistency as well. He’s had a special year in a lot of ways.”
Barkov could also be one of finalists for the Hart Trophy which is awarded to the league MVP and will be going to, perhaps unanimously, to Edmonton’s Connor McDavid.
Just being a finalist for league MVP shows how far Barkov’s star has risen.
And with it, the Panthers as well.
Since coming back from injury on April 3, Barkov has scored 13 goals with 21 points in 19 games including three of his team-leading six game-winning goals.
“When he’s on top of his game like this, I think he’s unstoppable,’’ teammate MacKenzie Weegar said.
“I can’t say enough good things about him. I truly think he’s the best player in the world.”
Sergei Bobrovsky said something similar about Barkov last month.
While Barkov is not one for individual accolades, he credits his team’s success to that of his own.
If the Panthers were languishing in sixth place and out of the playoffs, his name likely wouldn’t be mentioned for such postseason honors.
Yet here they are: Barkov and the Panthers, tied together in a bow. This year, it has all been positive.
“It means I’m probably doing something right,’’ Barkov told Florida Hockey Now on Saturday afternoon.
“When the team is having success, that’s where all the recognition comes from. When the team starts to win games, everybody’s paying attention to us.
“They see our team, who is playing well. People are paying attention to our team and our players. It has been a lot of fun this season. And the most fun we can have starts now with the playoffs.
“Everyone in our locker room is about our team’s success. We want to win together.”
TIME TO MOVE FORWARD
This is Barkov’s eighth season in the NHL yet it is only his second trip to the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Although the Panthers were part of the expanded postseason bubble last summer, Florida got bounced by the Islanders in four games and changes quickly came to his team.
Making the playoffs this season, and in such emphatic fashion, was a reward not only to the team’s long-suffering fanbase but to its core players.
Barkov, Jonathan Huberdeau — who, as the team’s leading scorer with 61 points is a Hart candidate as well — and Aaron Ekblad have been part of an uneven rebuild.
The trio were all top-three picks: Huberdeau third overall in 2011, Barkov second in 2013 and Ekblad first in 2014.
Now, the Panthers look poised to do something special.
Ekblad is hurt after fracturing his leg March 28 but hopes to return if the Panthers get far enough where he can come back and try and help.
For all of the additions that GM Bill Zito made to surround his core players, it was they — Barkov, Huberdeau and Ekblad — who were arguably Florida’s top three players throughout the season.
“I’m really excited. I haven’t been in the playoffs too many times,’’ Barkov said. “In our careers here — guys like myself, Huby, Eky — we have been here a long time and have been to the real playoffs once and then last year in the bubble.
“I’m excited for that and I’m excited about the season we had. We had a good season. We’re a happier team. We will have a lot more fun being in the playoffs.
“We clicked right away in training camp. We started doing the right things and everyone their job as good as possible and right from Game 1, we played like a family. That carried us all the way to here and now we’re ready to keep it going, play even better.”
BIG SEASON
Barkov would have been the first to tell you he was disappointed in himself last season as he came off his career-high 35 goals and 96 points to just 20 and 62 in 66 games.
Although he still refuses to talk much about it, Barkov played through injuries which started in training camp.
When the Panthers returned from their All-Star break in February, Barkov injured a knee on a hit in Montreal and probably rushed back.
Last year, Barkov finished the regular season with four goals and eight points in 17 games.
“There were a couple little bumps here and there but I can’t fully blame it on that,’’ Barkov said. “Even at the begining of the season, I was putting up some points — I had some assists, got on a couple goal streaks here and there. But I can’t say I was playing my best hockey.
“I wasn’t helping the team in many ways. I wasn’t putting up a lot of points, I wasn’t playing great defensively.
“I wasn’t being a good enough leader. This year, I have tried to be better at that. Even if I am not at my best in the offensive zone, I try to be my best in the defensive zone. I have been way better at that this year and that’s the biggest difference.”
The break during the pandemic appeared to help Barkov as he came back in the bubble looking more like himself.
He scored a goal with four points in four games against the Islanders and he played a strong game on both sides of the ice.
After Florida was bounced, Barkov returned home to Finland for his first extended stay in quite some time.
He spoke with Zito and Quenneville during his time at home and returned refreshed and committed to making this season better than the last.
“It helped having a good summer. Coach Q helped me a lot,’’ Barkov said. “Starting from last year, he would come to me ask what he could do better, what wasn’t working for me.
“We had a couple talks during the summer about what he expects me to do better at. He has seen a lot of great leaders, great players in the league and listening to him helped me out. People I worked with helped me out as well.
“I just had to be better. I think I’ve been taking the right steps and it started last summer. I looked forward to getting better every game, every day for this team.”
Quenneville noticed the difference in Barkov early on when the team gathered together in January.
“Barky has had a great training camp coming off an ordinary season that followed a great season,’’ Quenneville said. “He looks like he is going to start the season on a great note.”
BARKOV’S FUTURE IS IN FLORIDA
When this season is complete, Barkov will only have one year left on the six-year contract extension he signed in 2016.
Barkov and the Panthers can officially start negotiating a new contract in the summer although that wouldn’t kick in until the 2022-23 season.
With the career he has had so far and what he means to the Panthers, Barkov is due a major raise over the $6 million he makes annually.
It doesn’t sound like he wants to go anywhere but instead wants to try and lead the Panthers to great heights.
When the season started, there was a rumor teams were fishing around and calling Zito to see if Barkov was available. Barkov even joked about that Saturday.
“I obviously want to stay here, I want to win here. My biggest goal is to win here,” Barkov said in January.
The Panthers and Barkov will get to the contract soon enough.
Right now, all talk about future contracts is on hold with the playoffs. And it appears Barkov is cool with that. Something will get done, probably sooner than later.
“I haven’t really thought about it yet,’’ Barkov said. “I’m just enjoying what we’re doing right now. You’re actually the first guy this season who asked me about it. I forgot about it.”