Florida enters game in Chicago holding 5-1-1 record over past seven outings

A very successful early season road trip is within the grasp of the Florida Panthers.

The Cats are 1-0-1 over the past week after stops in Boston and Detroit, and they’ll wrap up their three-game roadie on Saturday night against the Chicago Blackhawks.

Chicago hasn’t played since Monday, an embarrassing 8-1 drubbing at Mullet Arena in Arizona. The blowout loss came on the heels of an invigorating 4-3 overtime road win over the Vegas Golden Knights, though that kind of extreme inconsistency isn’t terribly surprising of a younger squad.

Overall, the Blackhawks come into Saturday’s matchup with Florida holding a 3-6-0 record on the season and while they are still searching for their first victory on home ice, this will only be their third game at United Center.

To the surprise of very few, superstar rookie Connor Bedard has paced the Blackhawks in scoring, with four goals and six points so far in his young career.

On the Florida side of the ice, the Panthers are expected to carry the same lineup against Chicago that they rolled out during Thursday’s 2-0 win in Detroit.

Injured center Sam Bennett is considered week-to-week, per Florida Head Coach Paul Maurice, after he suffered an apparent lower-body injury on Monday night in Boston.

Last season the Panthers and Blackhawks split their two meetings, with each team winning on home ice. 

Since April of 2021, Florida has won five of the past six matchups with Chicago, going 5-1-0 during that span. 

Here are the lines and pairings the Panthers are expected to deploy on Saturday in Chicago:

Evan Rodrigues – Sahsa Barkov – Sam Reinhart

Carter Verhaeghe – Anton Lundell – Matthew Tkachuk

Eetu Luostarinen – Kevin Stenlund – Nick Cousins

Ryan Lomberg – Steven Lorentz – William Lockwood

Gus Forsling – Oliver Ekman-Larsson

Niko Mikkola – Dmitry Kulikov

Josh Mahura – Uvis Balinskis 

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