SUNRISE — The Florida Panthers saw a lot of positives from the closeout of their lengthy homestand that ended with a pair of wins.
Florida faces the much-improved Utah Mammoth tonight after earning points in three consecutive games, a feat they only accomplished three times this season.
The last run of the Panthers getting five of a possible six points concluded with an overtime win over Dallas on Nov. 1.
This has been a “scratch and claw” season from the start with Matthew Tkachuk, Sasha Barkov, and Tomas Nosek missing from the opening day lineup.
Dmitry Kulikov, Jonah Gadjovich, Eetu Luostarinen, and Cole Schwindt eventually joined the injured list.
Only Luostarinen is back.
After a 3-0 start to the season, the Panthers encountered multiple losing streaks.
Florida is 14-12-2, which is a reasonable accomplishment considering the staffing shortages.
Last season at the same time, they were 17-9-2 and were in first place in the Atlantic Division.
The modest recent streak took them from last to fifth in the Atlantic, four points and five teams from a wild card spot.
By contract, the Mammoth hold the final wild card spot in the West,
The Mammoth (who were the Arizona Coyotes up until 2024) has not made the playoffs for the five seasons and 12 of the past 13.
The Panthers are thankful for small things.
Only Luostarinen is back with no real timetable for any of the others. Matthew Tkachuk, per Paul Maurice, is not on this four-game road trip and will instead focus on a return in the coming weeks.
Still, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
The Panthers opened up a run of 11 of 12 at home and started off 3-5. They looked extremely disorganized at times, such as in blown leads to Philadelphia and Calgary.
Yet, the homestand concluded on a positive note.
With Luostarinen back for the past two games and a red hot Carter Verhaeghe back from a one-game leave for the birth of his first child, the team managed a hard-fought overtime loss to Nashville, a dramatic come from behind (twice) overtime win against Columbus, and a solid 4-1 defeat of the Islanders who had won three straight.
Verhaeghe was the NHL Third Star of the Week last week on the strength of his 4-1-5 in the three games he played.
“The numbers aren’t good on our homestand. We understand that,’’ Maurice said. “There’s only one game I really didn’t like. It was the Toronto game (4-1 loss). You’re sour about it for two days, but you look at the last two games and look at the difference of Luostarinen and Verhaeghe in our lineup.
“It’s two of your top six. When you’ve already got two of your top six out it makes a huge difference in how we look so getting those guys back, we’re more confident now. It will be a really tough road trip but we’re playing as well as we played in quite a while.”
Maurice made a point of highlighting the excellent play of backup goalie Daniil Tarasov, which is especially important with the number of back-to-backs coming up before the Olympic break.
Tarasov is 3-4-1 but sports a .911/2.47 GAA.
He didn’t not get a win until his fifth start of the season. It’s not that he didn’t play well but the Panthers did not give him offensive support.
Utah, Colorado and Dallas are on this road trip. They represent three of the top four teams in the Western Conference. It wraps in Tampa, which means this trip is not going to come easy.
Tarasov will start Thursday in Denver.
“Very fast, very disciplined, well-structured team,” Maurice said of the Mammoth at yesterday’s practice in Utah.
“Different systems but they look like us a lot in terms of the pace of their game. The next two will be maybe the two fastest games we play this year.”
ON DECK: GAME No. 29
FLORIDA PANTHERS at UTAH MAMMOTH
