Matthew Tkachuk Dominant in Return to Florida Panthers Lineup
Matthew Tkachuk scored two goals and added an assist in his first game since sustaining a lower-body injury at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February.
TAMPA — Matthew Tkachuk re-entered the Florida Panthers lineup with some thunder.
Tkachuk scored twice and picked up an assist in his return from a two-month absence to lead the Panthers to a 6-2 Game 1 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday night.
The Florida star sustained a lower-body injury while representing Team USA at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February that kept him out for the final two months of the regular season.
He tried playing through it during the championship game, but could not go on after the second period due to an injury he sustained a few nights before.
After watching Team Canada win that game in overtime from the bench, and two months of recovery, Tkachuk was ready to make an instant impact in yet another big game. And that he did.
“It feels amazing,” Tkachuk said. “I felt good going into that game and felt that I could give a great effort. I just didn’t have much left in me after the first period in that game in February. I wouldn’t change anything for the world, though. As sucky as it was the last two months, I was going to lay it all on the line in that tournament for your country.”
After getting a long runway to rehab his injury, Tkachuk’s status for Game 1 came down to the wire. He was a game-time decision up until Tuesday afternoon, when he was activated off long-term injured reserve.
“There’s been so many highs and lows, and you have some down days,” Tkachuk said. “You don’t know if this is going to be even possible, maybe even up until however long ago, I didn’t know if this day would be possible. So, it’s just great to be out there and I’m just super grateful. It makes you realize how great of a game it is and the best thing in the world is being out there competing and being around the guys. I’m loving it being back.”
It happened, and his impact was instant both on and off the ice.
”He is not a guy you can put a label on becuase he is such a unicorn of a player,” Nate Schmidt said. “But more than anything, just how he is in the room getting guys fired up before the game. You can feel his energy, you feel his excitement in the locker room and I think it takes the edge off of guys quite a bit. The edge off the guys to be vocal, the edge off the guys with the things he says before the game to keep the room light, and I think that’s the kind of thing that doesn’t show up all the time, but you see him being able to step into a game and be impactful and that’s just the way he is. That’s the player he is.
“He is playoff player and does what he does tonight.”
The Panthers jumped to an early lead, taking a 3-1 lead early in the second period, and Tkachuk came through with the dagger right when they needed it.
Just 15 seconds after Schmidt’s goal to give Florida the lead — and an unsuccessful challenge by Tampa for goalie interference — Tkachuk made his move. He froze Andrei Vasilevskiy with a quick backhand-forehand move and beat home with a wrist shot on the ensuing power play to make it a three-goal game.
He scored again less than five minutes later, beating Vasilevskiy with a wide-angle shot through traffic to give the Panthers a four-goal cushion.
“What was on display was the hands,” coach Paul Maurice said. “They’re just an incredible set of hands.
“If you put it in the context that he hasn’t played a hockey game in two months, you or I wouldn’t have any hands in that game. For him, he can still take that much time off and handle the puck the way he handled it.”