Panthers look to lock up home ice advantage with final home stand of the regular season
Panthers finish the regular season with four consecutive home games
The Florida Panthers have just four games remaining on the schedule and all will be in the friendly confines of Amerant Bank Arena.
They will begin this stretch on Tuesday, taking on the Ottawa Senators in another battle between the Tkachuk brothers and there is no love lost between these two teams.
The week then continues with the last place Columbus Blue Jackets coming to town Thursday and then a Sabres team that is just clinging on their long shot playoff dreams on Saturday.
The Panthers have struggled as of late, but it seems to be more of a concern to outsiders then it is inside the locker room.
“I think we’ve felt it coming for a while now” forward Evan Rodrigues said in regards to the playoffs. “I think our team is built for playoff hockey. You don’t like to look ahead to the playoffs. You want to take it game by game and we’re going to do that/ At the same time, there’s an excitement".
As of Tuesday, The Toronto Maple Leafs are just two points back of the Panthers for the second seed in the Atlantic Division. These two teams will meet head to head on April 16, which will conclude the Panthers regular season.
The Leafs do have one game remaining after that, but Florida will have an idea by then of their final seeding and if they will host the first round of the playoffs.
The second season in hockey is almost underway, interesting to see how this final home stretch plays out for the Cats.
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