Reinhart becomes just the fourth player in Panthers franchise history to score 40 goals in a season
Reinhart becomes just the fourth player in Panthers franchise history to score 40 goals in a season
It's been an amazing season for Florida Panthers forward Sam Reinhart.
The 28-year-old is enjoying a career year while helping Florida maintain its position as one of the top teams in the NHL.
Until recently, Reinhart had been scoring goals seemingly at will since the puck dropped on opening night.
He started the season with eight goals in a seven-game span.
After logging 15 combined goals between November and December, which is certainly nothing to sneeze at, Reinhart came out after New Year's like gangbusters.
Florida played 13 games during the month of January and Reinhart scored in all but one of them, racking up 14 goals.
"It's remarkable. I don't know if I've ever seen a player this hot," Panthers center Sam Bennett said after Reinhart scored his 39th goal. "It seems like every time he touches the puck, there's a really good chance it's going in the net. It's awesome to watch."
After reaching 39 goals, Reinhart hit his first bump in the road.
He went seven games between goals, by far his longest drought of the season.
Then on Thursday night against the visiting Montreal Canadiens, with Florida on the power play late in the second period, Matthew Tkachuk did what he’s done countless times this season and found Reinhart between the circles with a perfect pass.
Reinhart made no mistake, beating Canadiens goaltender Samuel Montembeault to cash in on his 40th goal of the year.
He becomes just the fourth player in Panthers history to reach the 40-goal plateau.
Pavel Bure did it twice, scoring 58 goals in 1999-2000 before adding 59 the following year, and then last season both Carter Verhaeghe (42 goals) and Matthew Tkachuk (40 goals) hit the milestone.
One thing about Reinhart's scoring that amazes those who watch him every day is that he never sacrifices the defensive side of his game to chase the offense.
Reinhart works just as hard on the backcheck and in the defensive zone as he does everywhere else on the ice.
He is a true 200-foot player that is scoring like one that never leaves the o-zone.
“It's incredible," said Panthers captain Sasha Barkov. "Just the way he plays, it's not at all about the goal scoring. Like I've said many times before, he does all the right things on the ice defensively, he hasn't cheated once this this year, he's always on the right side of the puck, and that's even more impressive."
As for Reinhart’s 40th, it was quite fitting that it came on the power play.
More than half of his goals have come with Florida on the man advantage. He’s now up to 23 PPGs and counting.
He’s also scored four shorthanded goals.
It certainly appears that 2023-24 is the Year…no, the Season of the Reino, at least in South Florida.
“If we need a goal on the power play or whenever, you know that he's gonna be there,” said Bennett. “He's scored some massive goals for us this year. It's awesome to see.”
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