Sam Bennett a ‘Gametime Decision’ for Panthers vs. Devils
Sam Bennett is a game-time decision for Thursday night’s game against the New Jersey Devils after participating in the morning skate.
Photo by Colby Guy
FORT LAUDERDALE — Sam Bennett will be a game-time decision for the Florida Panthers on Thursday night in the second of back-to-back games against the New Jersey Devils.
Bennett was a late scratch for Tuesday night’s 4-1 loss to the Devils after something “tightened up” on him in the morning and could not loosen up before the game.
He participated in Thursday’s morning skate ahead of the game, and per Paul Maurice, is progressing well.
“He seems fine, he seems ready to go, so our expectation is that he comes back,” Maurice said. “But we won’t be declaring him playing until he gets through warm-up but he looks right.”
Bennett and Matthew Tkachuk had a new linemate during morning skate on Tuesday — Jesper Boqvist.
He filled in on that second line alongside Tkachuk and Evan Rodrigues during Florida’s last game. Rodrigues will go down to Boqvist’s usual spot on the right side of the third line with Eetu Luostarinen and Anton Lundell on Thursday.
“I’ve always been looking ahead at what might work and I’ve been interested in seeing Jesper on the left side for almost two or three weeks now,” Maurice said. “We’ve played four games with our forward lineup [fully healthy] we just haven’t had a chance to do it, so we’ll take a look at it tonight.”
Bennett has started off the 2024-25 campaign on one of the best paces of his career, scoring nine goals and 15 points in 15 games.
The 28-year-old forward is set to be an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season, when his contract expires.
THE NEWS
Sergei Bobrovsky will start in net on Thursday night against the New Jersey Devils.
Today’s game will air at 7:00 p.m. EST and will be broadcasted on Scripps Sports and the Panthers Plus app. Out-of-market fans can stream the game on ESPN+.
For more information on how to catch Panthers games this season, visit nhl.com/panthers/info/how-to-watch.
PANTHERS PROJECTED LINEUP
Carter Verhaeghe — Aleksander Barkov — Sam Reinhart
Jesper Boqvist — Sam Bennett — Matthew Tkachuk
Eetu Luostarinen — Anton Lundell — Evan Rodrigues
A.J. Greer — Tomas Nosek — Jonah Gadjovich
Gustav Forsling — Aaron Ekblad
Niko Mikkola — Dmitry Kulikov
Nate Schmidt — Uvis Balinskis
Sergei Bobrovsky
Spencer Knight
Scratched: Adam Boqvist, Mackie Samoskevich
NEW JERSEY DEVILS PROJECTED LINEUP
Ondrej Palat — Jack Hughes — Jesper Bratt
Timo Meier — Nico Hischier — Dawson Mercer
Paul Cotter — Erik Haula — Stefan Noesen
Tomas Tatar — Justin Dowling — Kurtis MacDermid
Brendan Dillon — Dougie Hamilton
Jonas Siegenthaler — Johnathan Kovacevic
Luke Hughes — Brett Pesce
Jake Allen
Jacob Markstrom
*Opposing team lines subject to change.