Huberdeau is getting ‘better and better every year.’ He’s already building on huge 2021
In 2021, only Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl scored more points than Jonathan Huberdeau.
On the first day of 2022, only three players scored more than the star left wing.
“It’s fun to watch,” forward Sam Reinhart said Saturday after Huberdeau tallied three points in the Florida Panthers’ 5-2 win against the Montreal Canadiens in Sunrise.
“He’s a heck of a player,” added forward Sam Bennett, who has been Huberdeau’s center in nearly every game since he joined the team ahead of the trade deadline last year.
Right now, the list of players better than Huberdeau isn’t long and the forward, who was the only Panther to make an NHL All-Star team last year, has never been better.
In the last two games, Huberdeau has tallied eight points and it’s the second time this season he has pulled off such a feat.
On Thursday, the 28-year-old Canadian notched five points as part of Florida’s nine-goal eruption and blowout win against the Tampa Bay Lightning to finish the year with 99. On Saturday, he tallied three, including an assist on the game-tying goal, to help the Panthers (21-7-4) rally past the Canadiens.
Of Huberdeau’s eight points in the last two games, seven have been assists, including all three Saturday. He finished 2021 with 31 goals and 68 assists, and the only two players who finished with more points than him are linemates on the middle-of-the-pack Edmonton Oilers. Huberdeau might just be the best player on the best team in the league as the calendar flips to 2022.
“It’s impressive,” said Bennett, who scored twice of Huberdeau assists Saturday. “Every day he’ll amaze me with something I’ve never seen him do.”
Look no further than his fourth point — and third assist — from Thursday.
In the third period, Huberdeau trailed Anthony Duclair as the winger led the rush into the offensive zone. He fielded a pass from Duclair near the left point and, in one motion, spun to his left, turned his back to the net and whipped a backhanded precision pass to the right faceoff circle, where star defenseman Aaron Ekblad scored Florida’s eighth goal.
The crowd at FLA Live Arena was giddy and so were Huberdeau’s teammates. The All-Star laughed about the play after the game.
“Probably unnecessary,” he said Thursday, “but I was just confident, I guess.”
Given the last year, he has every reason to be.
While Aleksander Barkov emerged as the Panthers’ consensus best player during the 2020-21 NHL season, the star center has played in just 19 games this year because of injuries and Florida hasn’t missed a beat. The Panthers have the second best points percentage in the league and Huberdeau, with 41 points, has 15 points more than any of his teammates.
This Florida team runs on its offense, leading the Eastern Conference in both shots on goal and goals per game, and Huberdeau is its engine. He almost certainly won’t lead the league in goals, and he’ll probably never get quite the recognition Barkov does as the captain and franchise player, but Huberdeau, who was the No. 3 overall pick in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft, has taken a title Barkov has finally ceded.
He might just be the most underrated player in the league.
“You get better and better every year,” he said. “I’m not the fastest guy out there, but I think I use my toolbox.”
