A Florida victory would force Game 6 on Friday night in Sunrise
A Florida victory would force Game 6 on Friday night in Sunrise
The Florida Panthers are a team that believes they are capable of competing for the Stanley Cup.
If anybody knows just what that group is capable of, it’s the men who have been giving their blood, sweat and tears day in and day out for the past seven months.
On Wednesday night in Boston, the time will come for the Panthers to put up or shut up.
Florida enters Game 5 trailing the league-best Bruins 3-1 in their best-of-7 opening-round series after dropping back-to-back games on home ice.
On the surface, seeing Boston a game away from eliminating the eighth-seed Panthers seems to align with the general expectation of how the first round should go.
Looking deeper into the numbers though, things haven’t been as one-sided as the scoreboard may indicate.
The series has been tightly contested, with Florida being arguably the better team at even strength.
“We know we can win,” said Panthers winger Anton Lundell. “We just need to play well all 60 minutes and try to stay together and help each other. If somebody makes a mistake, we’ll be there supporting each other.”
Florida has done a good job in this series of starting games strong.
Where they’ve run into trouble is taking undisciplined penalties and allowing Boston’s lethal power play go to work.
It’s something the Panthers know could doom their season if it continues.
“There’s some things that we’ve got to clean up, but for the most part we’re batting hard,” said Florida defenseman Brandon Montour. “We’ve got the right mindset. We know what to do.”
Overall, the Panthers have shown they can compete with Boston. They have also shown where Boston holds the edge.
If Florida can figure out how to lean into the good and avoid doing the bad, they might just find themselves playing another game on home ice this week.
“I have no doubt in this room that everybody's going to show up and bring their best effort,” said Montour. “The belief is there, we’ve just got to bring our execution and we'll be alright.”
LINEUP NOTES
Aaron Ekblad and Anthony Duclair, who both missed Game 4 with undisclosed injuries, will be on the ice for Game 5.
Both players were full participants in Tuesday’s practice at FLA Live Arena and Maurice said afterwards that they’d be good to go.
There is still some mystery, however, surrounding Florida’s forwards, and exactly which 12 will be in Wednesday’s lineup.
Sam Bennett and Ryan Lomberg were not on the ice Tuesday.
When asked about their absence, Maurice said he expects one of them to play in Game 5 and for the other to be a game-time decision. He did not say which was which.
Also not yet known is who will patrol Florida’s goal crease, Sergei Bobrovsky or Alex Lyon.
Maurice wouldn’t disclose which goaltender he would start, only saying he knows he’ll be comfortable with whichever option he goes with.
“The challenge with it is they both play a similar game,” Maurice said. “They both played very, very well. They probably each have one they'd like to have back. They both made big saves and maybe, and this is a positive, I’ve got complete confidence in either one of them playing.”
For Boston, captain and top line center Patrice Bergeron joined his teammates for practice between games and could make his series debut Wednesday night.
MORNING SKATE UPDATES:
Maurice had no update on the status of Bennett or Lomberg.
"Everybody is healthy, everybody is a game-time decision," he said. "Then I'll give you the truth later."
Predictably, there was also no update on a starting goaltender.
WHAT THEY’RE SAYING
Gus Forsling on repeating the effort from Game 2: “I think we can look back at that game, we played real good, and we want to create that again.”
Carter Verhseghe on the importance of scoring first: “I feel like the last couple of games they got the first goal and we we're trying to play catch up a little bit, and it kind of took us away from how we wanted to play, too. The first goal is huge and hopefully we can get it.”
Paul Maurice on building off another strong start: “We want to be able to push for 60 (minutes) but we’d like to take our first periods, minus the penalties, and repeat them.”