Florida wants to keep pace in the race for the top spot in the East while the Islanders are fighting for a playoff spot

The Florida Panthers penultimate homestand continues on Wednesday night with the Cats looking to get back in the win column.

Florida has picked up two points in only one of its past six games, with the 1-4-1 stretch representing the Panthers' worst six-game run of the season.

Fortunately for Florida, the team has shown signs of breaking out of their late-season slump.

After Tuesday's frustrating loss to the Boston Bruins in which the Panthers surrendered a late third period lead for the second time in three games, Florida Head Coach Paul Maurice said he was pleased with how his team performed and added that they've looked good in several of their recent outings.

"I liked our game tonight," said Maurice. "That's four in six for us."

Thursday will be the third and final regular season meeting between the Panthers and Islanders.

So far, each team has won in the others' building, with New York picking up a 4-3 win in Sunrise on Dec. 2 and Florida getting out of Long Island with a 3-2 overtime win on Jan. 28 after giving up a goal to Kyle Palmieri with 1:29 to go that pushed the game past regulation.

The Islanders have been fighting as hard as they can to remain in the playoff hunt for a while now, currently sitting six points behind Washington for the final Wildcard spot with 11 games to play.

Florida has 10 games left on its schedule, and the main goal between now and then will be staying healthy as they prepare for the postseason.

The only injured player currently on the Panthers roster is defenseman Aaron Ekblad, and he could return to the lineup as soon as this week.

Ekblad hasn't played since suffering a lower-body injury on March 9, but he's been skating for more than a week and participated in his first full-contact practice on Tuesday during Florida's morning skate.

Maurice has said he'd like Ekblad to get in a couple practices before returning to game action, but due to Florida's schedule, that may not be possible.

They aren't having a formal practice again until early next month.

Here are the Panthers projected lines and pairings ahead of Thursday's battle with the Islanders:

Evan Rodrigues – Sasha Barkov – Vladimir Tarasenko

Carter Verhaeghe – Sam Bennett – Matthew Tkachuk

Eetu Luostarinen – Anton Lundell – Sam Bennett

Jonah Gadjovich – Kevin Stenlund – Ryan Lomberg

Gus Forsling – Brandon Montour

Niko Mikkola – Josh Mahura

Oliver Ekman-Larsson – Dmitry Kulikov 

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