COLUMBUS, OH – The Florida Panthers will kick off a five-game road trip with a matinee matchup against the Columbus Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena on Sunday at 1 p.m. ET.
“It’s a long road trip,” forward Anton Lundell said. “We have good confidence and are just trying to build off what we do. We want to play better every game. That’s our goal.”
Sitting in second place in the Atlantic Division with a record of 16-8-2, the Panthers will follow their clash in Columbus with stops in Seattle, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary.
“This is the grind now,” head coach Paul Maurice said. “It starts kind of like that first week of December and straight through the All-Star break. It’s a sprint after the break. This is the grind time. We’ll be at 18 road games by the end of this trip and then do another one early in January. … You want to stay healthy. We’ll run short shifts. We’ll run four lines and grind our way through. We’ve been pretty good at that this year.”
Winning two of three games on their recent homestand, the Panthers hit the road on the heels of a 3-1 win over the Penguins on Friday. Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Eetu Luostarinen and Aleksander Barkov scored in the win, while Lundell had two assists.
Shutting it down in the third period, the Panthers held Pittsburgh to just five shots on goal.
“It was a good game from the whole team,” Lundell said. “Just some stuff we want to improve, for sure. I don’t think it was our very best game, but we found a way to win.”
After making 26 saves against the Penguins to extend his personal winning streak to four games, Sergei Bobrovsky will get a breather against his former team in Columbus.
Owning a 3-2-1 record with a. 917 save percentage, backup Anthony Stolarz will get the start.
“I really, really like the way Sergei’s playing,” Maurice said. “That’s priority one, we want to keep him in that rhythm. The next thing would be he can’t play 70 games. It has nothing to do with his age. It has to do with goaltenders and our travel.”
Sam Reinhart leads Florida in goals (17) and points (33). Barkov is second in scoring with 25 points (nine goals, 16 assists), while Carter Verhaeghe is third with 22 points, including 12 goals. Evan Rodrigues is fourth with 21 points (six goals, 15 assists).
In terms of lineup changes against the Blue Jackets, Steven Lorentz will replace Jonah Gadjovich on the fourth line, while Uvis Balinskis, who found the back of the net during his one-game stint in the AHL last week, will slot in for Dmitry Kulikov on the blue line.
Stuck in last place in the Metropolitan Division with a record of 9-15-5, the Blue Jackets snapped out of a three-game losing streak with a 5-2 win against the Blues on Friday.
Leading 2-1 after 40 minutes, the Blue Jackets pulled away from St. Louis in the third period on two gaols from Yegor Chinakhov and one goal from Alexandre Texier. In the crease, Jet Greaves, making just his second-career NHL start, stopped 41 of 42 shots.
Fresh off his first NHL win, Greaves is expected to start again for Columbus this afternoon.
“It’s a really good game to build on for this group,” Greaves told reporters after the win over the Blues. “Something we’ve talked about is making sure we close out games in the third, and I thought we did a great job with that.”
Bitten by the injury bug in the early goings of this season, the Blue Jackets lost another player to the injured list on Saturday as captain Boone Jenner is expected to miss six weeks with a fractured jaw after taking a puck off the face against St. Louis.
As it stands now, Jenner is the highest-scoring forward on the team with 18 points (13 goals, five assists). Zach Werenski paces the club with 20 points (one goal, 19 assists). Tied for third, Kirill Marchenko and rookie Adam Fantilli are tied for third with 16 points.
Just 19 years old, Fantilli was taken with the third-overall pick in the 2023 NHL Draft.
Facing off for the second time this season, Verhaeghe scored the game-winning goal in overtime to lift the Panthers to a 5-4 win over the Blue Jackets at Amerant Bank Arena on Nov. 6.
In that win, Florida led 3-0 before eventually trailing 4-3 late in regulation.
Nick Cousins scored the game-tying goal to force overtime.
“I don’t think we’ve played a complete 60 minutes, it feels like, against Columbus,” Maurice. “In part because you never have them out of it. They’re going to play hard for 60 minutes. You look at the goals they score, it doesn’t take much for these guys to get the puck to the net and in the net. This team is right on the cusp. [When] they get healthy, they’re going to be a good hard team to play.”
PREGAME QUOTES
“Both goalies are great. It doesn’t matter who we have in net. We have full trust in them. We want to be good in front of them and help them and make their job easier. Yeah, we have two good goaltenders.” – Anton Lundell on Florida’s goaltending tandem of Sergei Bobrovsky and Anthony Stolarz
“The last two games we have been really good, we have to keep it going on the road too.” – Eetu Luostarinen on maintaining momentum on the road
“He’s a very proud man, as you would have to be to have the career that he’s had. I mean he was the driving player in Arizona for a very long time… I think it was humbling when he gets bought out after being that kind of player, so he wants an opportunity to come back into the league and be the player he was. This was the perfect fit for him.” – Paul Maurice on Oliver Ekman-Larsson getting off to a hot start with the Panthers
FIVE CATS STATS
- Aleksander Barkov leads all NHL forwards with a +19 rating.
- The Panthers rank fourth in the NHL in fewest goals allowed per game (2.54).
- Carter Verhaeghe has scored in three of his last four games.
- Florida ranks third in the NHL with a 55.90 CF% at 5-on-5.
- Sam Reinhart is riding a four-game point streak.
PROJECTED LINEUP (SUBJECT TO CHANGE)
Forwards
Carter Verhaeghe – Aleksander Barkov – Sam Reinhart
Nick Cousins – Sam Bennett – Matthew Tkachuk
Eetu Luostarinen – Anton Lundell – Evan Rodrigues
Steven Lorentz – Kevin Stenlund – Ryan Lomberg
Defensemen
Gustav Forsling – Aaron Ekblad
Niko Mikkola - Brandon Montour
Oliver-Ekman Larsson – Uvis Balinskis
Goaltenders
Anthony Stolarz
Sergei Bobrovsky
RECENT TRANSACTIONS
- Dec. 7: F Josh Davies signed to a three-year, entry-level contract
- Dec. 3: D Uvis Balinskis recalled from Charlotte (AHL)
HOW TO WATCH
When: Sunday, Dec. 10 at 1 p.m. ET
Where: Nationwide Arena – Columbus, OH
TV & Streaming: Bally Sports Florida, Bally Sports+, NHL Network
Radio: 560 WQAM (Dade/Broward); 1230 WBZT (Palm Beach); 100.3 WCTH (Florida Keys); 101.7 WCZR (Treasure Coast); SiriusXM App & Streaming 932; Panthers App
