‘Everybody’s starting to slot in:’ New Florida Panthers players step up in home opener

When the Florida Panthers last took the ice for a meaningful game in Sunrise, the hope to hoist a Stanley Cup was still alive, even if just barely. Harsh reality didn’t officially set in for another three days.

The Panthers’ run through to the 2023 Stanley Cup Final was miraculous — the players themselves even admitted it — and ignited South Florida’s hockey fandom unlike anything in a generation, and yet the Panthers were battered and beaten by the end of it. Their two best defensemen were seriously injured. They knew that group would never get to play together again because no team ever stays completely together. They’d have to wait another year for another chance to bring Florida its first Stanley Cup and it would mean another regular-season grind, just like the one they slogged through last year.

“The past is dead,” goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky said after the Panthers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 3-1 to win their first home game of the 2023-24 NHL season.

At Florida’s first official home game since the Stanley Cup Final on Thursday, this was the Panthers’ new reality: There was no ring ceremony and Florida didn’t even make any sort of show out of unveiling its new Eastern Conference-champions banner. Nine of the 20 players on the active roster weren’t with the team at all last season. Aaron Ekblad, Brandon Montour and Sam Bennett, all such important parts of the run to the Cup Final and now all sidelined by injuries, banged the drum to fire up the crowd ahead of the game instead of suiting up to face the Maple Leafs.

Even the arena has a new name: Amerant Bank Arena.

These Panthers (2-2-0) are not revamped, but they are different. The first two goal-scorers were new forward Kevin Stenlund and new defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Winger Evan Rodrigues, who entered the home opener tied for the team lead with five points, led Florida with four 5-on-5 shots and helped the Panthers’ top line outshoot Toronto, 7-2, when it was on the ice.

Even with all the change, Florida played the same type of game it did for so much of last season: low scoring, highly intense and up for grabs until the very end when Stenlund and Niko Mikkola, another new defenseman, both blocked shots in the final minute to shut down a 6-on-4 power play for the Maple Leafs.

“It really felt like a playoff-type win,” All-Star right wing Matthew Tkachuk said. “Everybody was putting their bodies on the line. That’s very important We saw what it was like last year. We got in [the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs] by a point, so these points matter.”

Four games into the season, the Panthers feel like they’re off to a good start.

Some of the change won’t be permanent — Florida expects Ekblad and Montour back by the end of December, and Bennett should return to the lineup by the end of this first homestand. Some is just the product of what happens after a run to a championship.

The Panthers couldn’t afford to bring back defenseman Radko Gudas and winger Anthony Duclair and maintain the flexibility to keep the rest of the core of the roster intact; there were always going to be salary-cap casualties.

However they arrived in Florida, the eight newcomers will eventually start to feel familiar and Thursday provided a strong foundation.

“The biggest thing when you’re in a new environment is kind of figuring out your role and then once you figure that out, that’s when you can start kind of perfecting it,” Tkachuk said. “Everybody’s starting to slot in and fit — especially with all these guys out — pretty well right now.”

The ending was the sort of evidence the Panthers needed.

With 1:09 left and Florida up 2-1, All-Star center Aleksander Barkov committed a penalty, giving the Maple Leafs a 6-on-4 advantage with their goaltender pulled.

One shot away from tying the game, Toronto didn’t even put one on net. One shot went wide. Another two got blocked by Stenlund and Mikkola. The Panthers blocked 26 in total.

Florida doesn’t need any of these newcomers to become stars. The Panthers just need them to contribute in subtle ways.

So far, so good.

“It’s still new for me, but I think I’m going into it pretty well,” Stenlund said. “I’m just trying to be smart and think the game. … It works well.”

This story was originally published October 19, 2023 at 11:06 PM.