Florida Panthers Look to Continue to Play With Emotion vs. Carolina Hurricanes
The Florida Panthers look to sustain their level of play from their 4-1 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Monday as they open a home-and-home set with the Carolina Hurricanes.
After snapping a stretch of losses in six of their past seven games, the Florida Panthers are looking to build off of it in a match-up with the Eastern Conference-leading Carolina Hurricanes on Friday afternoon.
Florida snapped out of its rut looking like a whole different team on Wednesday — playing with a lot more fire and looking like their usual selves in a 4-1 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The defending Stanley Cup champions have had trouble during that stretch finding the level of emotion it takes to play the game they play every night, but a mix of a division rival coming to town and an emotional day of practice on Tuesday got them up for that game.
They hope to get back on track and keep playing that same style.
“I think getting a little bit emotional on the ice definitely helps,” Carter Verhaeghe said. “It’s tough getting emotional after going to back-to-back Stanley Cup Finals and playing so many playoff games. It comes really natural in the playoffs, and I think in the regular season, it’s hard and you have to manufacture it a little bit. I think that’s what we are trying to do right now.”
Carolina is the perfect test to see if this group can sustain this level of play.
The Hurricanes played the Panthers with a whole lot of fire last season after they were knocked out by Florida in the Eastern Conference final in 2023.
That same level of emotion is expected as they open the home-and-home series in Raleigh.
“I think anytime we play division rivals [and teams we played in the playoffs,] it’s a lot of fun,” Verhaeghe said after Wednesday’s game. “There is a lot more emotion to the game and you saw it tonight. We came out, we wanted to play with a little bit more purpose than the last couple of weeks, so it was a big one.”
THE NEWS
Sergei Bobrovsky will start in goal for the Panthers against the Maple Leafs tonight.
Anton Lundell will return to the lineup after missing Wednesday night’s game. Jonah Gadjovich will come out of the lineup.
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Today’s game will air at 3:00 p.m. EST and will be broadcasted on Scripps Sports and the Panthers Plus app. It will also be available on ESPN+ for out-of-market viewers.
For more information on how to catch Panthers games this season, visit nhl.com/panthers/info/how-to-watch.
PANTHERS PROJECTED LINEUP
Evan Rodrigues — Aleksander Barkov — Sam Reinhart
Carter Verhaeghe — Sam Bennett — Matthew Tkachuk
Eetu Luostarinen — Anton Lundell — Mackie Samoskevich
A.J. Greer — Tomas Nosek — Jesper Boqvist
Gustav Forsling — Aaron Ekblad
Niko Mikkola — Dmitry Kulikov
Nate Schmidt — Uvis Balinskis
Spencer Knight
Sergei Bobrovsky
Scratched: Adam Boqvist, Jonah Gadjovich
CAROLINA HURRICANES PROJECTED LINEUP
Andrei Svechnikov — Sebastian Aho — Jack Roslovic
Seth Jarvis — Jack Drury — Martin Necas
William Carrier — Jordan Staal — Jordan Martinook
Eric Robinson — Jesperi Kotkaniemi — Jackson Blake
Jaccob Slavin — Brent Burns
Dmitry Orlov — Jalen Chatfield
Shayne Gostisbehere — Sean Walker
Spencer Martin
Yaniv Perets
(Lines via NHL.com)
*Opposing team lines subject to change.
Colby, for the next mailbag, can you talk some about whatever is going on with Tkachuk? Seems like he hasn’t played like “himself” since his sternum injury and he just looks hurt, slow, and not all there.