GDT: 12/30/14 "French Connection" - Canadiens VS Panthers

[Panthers Rock]

Your Florida Panthers take on the Montreal Canadiens! Game time at 7:30pm EST live from BB&T Center!

TV: Live on FSN Florida and Center Ice.
Radio: Listen Live on 560 WQAM​

VS

​

[fieldset=Standings]

Link To Current NHL Standings
Florida:

Wins | Losses | OTL/SOL | Total Points
16 |9 |8 |40

Montreal:

Wins | Losses | OTL/SOL | Total Points
23|11|2|48

[/fieldset]

[fieldset=Injuries]

Montreal:

Player | Date Of Incident | Status |Injury
None

Florida:​

Player | Date Of Incident | Status |Injury
S. Thornton, LW |Dec 12, 2014 |IR |Groin

[/fieldset]

[fieldset=Line Combinations (Subject To Change)]

Montreal:

LW |C| RW
Max Pacioretty|Alex Galchenyuk|Brendan Gallagher
David Desharnais|Tomas Plekanec|P.A. Parenteau
Jiri Sekac|Lars Eller|Brandon Prust
Sven Andrighetto|Manny Malhotra|Dale Weise

LD|RD
Andrei Markov|P.K. Subban
Nathan Beaulieu|Sergei Gonchar
Alexei Emelin|Tom Gilbert

Florida:

LW| C |RW
Jonathan Huberdeau|Nick Bjugstad|Vincent Trocheck
Sean Bergenheim|Aleksander Barkov|Jimmy Hayes
Jussi Jokinen|Dave Bolland|Brad Boyes
Tomas Kopecky|Derek MacKenzie|Scottie Upshall

LD|RD
Brian Campbell|Aaron Ekblad
Willie Mitchell|Dmitry Kulikov
Dylan Olsen|Erik Gudbranson

[/fieldset]

[fieldset=Expected Starting Goaltenders]

Montreal:

Carey Price

GP | W | L | OTL | GAA | SV% | SO
29|19|9|1| 2.23| .926|2

VS.

Florida:

Roberto Luongo

GP | W | L | OTL | GAA | SV% | SO
27|14|7|6| 2.36| .921|1

[/fieldset]

[fieldset=Special Teams]

Montreal:

PP%|PP Rank|PK%|PK Rank
15.0%|24th|85.7%|5th

Florida:

PP%|PP Rank|PK%|PK Rank
13.6%|28th|81.0%|15th

[/fieldset]

[fieldset=Red Hot: Cat Of The Night]

Jonathan Huberdeau has 3 points in his last 3 games.​

[/fieldset]

Last Game VS. Canadiens


Last Game Played


Tonight

​

LET'S GO PANTHERS!!!!!!!!!!

​

Click to read more...

 

[IM Clutcm]

Looking for a big game from Huberdeau. He's been excellent lately.

 

[Android 16]

Win or lose, despite all the offensive disappointment from this team, I'm appreciative that I get to focus on Panthers hockey and a push to the playoffs in December rather than being way out of it and watching the WJC tournament.

 

[ucanthanzalthetruth]

You have Price as the starter but I'm pretty sure it'll be Tokarski

I was bored and just checked the Panthers schedule. February is probably the hardest stretch of games I can remember them playing in 5+ years.

 

[Galchenioretty]

You have Price as the starter but I'm pretty sure it'll be Tokarski

I was bored and just checked the Panthers schedule. February is probably the hardest stretch of games I can remember them playing in 5+ years.

Wouldn't surprise me at all if it were Price again since the Habs are off until Fri - Sat b2b and had 5 days off before last night's game.

Logically if they wanted to split these games, Tokarski should have got Carolina.

 

[ucanthanzalthetruth]

Wouldn't surprise me at all if it were Price again since the Habs are off until Fri - Sat b2b and had 5 days off before last night's game.

Logically if they wanted to split these games, Tokarski should have got Carolina.

better for Florida since last I checked goalies playing both games of a b2b were 4-22-2 (beginning of December)

 

[CHGoalie27]

Theyd have to be clinically insane to give us their backup.

 

[angry_treefrog]

With a win tonight the Panthers will have Wins = Losses + OTL/SOL.

IMO, in order for the Panthers to be a legitimate playoff caliber team, that is the first milestone they need to reach.

The next step will be to get that goal differential into the positive range.

 

[PanthersHockey1]

With a win tonight the Panthers will have Wins = Losses + OTL/SOL.

IMO, in order for the Panthers to be a legitimate playoff caliber team, that is the first milestone they need to reach.

The next step will be to get that goal differential into the positive range.

I agree with the first thing that our wins should be greater than our total losses. I dont put too much stock into +/- right now because our offense will never let us win games by more than 2 goal margins.

When we win we win by a goal when we lose in regulation its usually greater than 2 goals. Anaheim is leading the league and their +/- is worse than others below them.

 

[EnforceTheLaus]

Full house tonight. Mostly Hab fans, but color me surprised how loud our guys were last game. Hope the same result too

 

[spacemanatee]

Full house tonight. Mostly Hab fans, but color me surprised how loud our guys were last game. Hope the same result too

this is ****ing awesome news. alot of $$$$

 

[EnforceTheLaus]

Per GR Kopy is out with minor injury and Flash is. Lu today Cubano tommorrow.

 

[Boothinator]

I dont like Flash over Pirri..

 

[IM Clutcm]

I dont like Flash over Pirri..

For a fourth line role I think it's the right call.

 

[EnforceTheLaus]

We've been bamboozled. This is no 18 year old:

 

[RCDeltaFixer]

You have Price as the starter but I'm pretty sure it'll be Tokarski

I was bored and just checked the Panthers schedule. February is probably the hardest stretch of games I can remember them playing in 5+ years.

Wow, you weren't kidding about February. January seems fairly easy, March + April seem medium difficulty.

 

[Theodore450]

So excited for tonight game. I hope it goes to OT so both my teams get a point
Good to see a sellout

 

[adam graves]

I agree with the first thing that our wins should be greater than our total losses. I dont put too much stock into +/- right now because our offense will never let us win games by more than 2 goal margins.

When we win we win by a goal when we lose in regulation its usually greater than 2 goals. Anaheim is leading the league and their +/- is worse than others below them.

Sorry, Im with ATF on this.

We are the only team within 5 points of a playoff spot with a minus differential. We are about 26th in the league. Its unsustainable season long.

 

[Jean Luc Discard]

I dont like Flash over Pirri..

Don't like Flash anywhere near this team.

 

[PJ Kings Hockey]

TSN has a nice article about the Panthers.

The surprising development of the Florida Panthers

The fact that Florida has suddenly developed into a quality playoff hockey team has to be particularly disheartening to the couple of Eastern Conference teams who are hanging on for dear life right now...

What makes Florida particularly fascinating as a contender is that it seems as though everything’s come together at the right time. Obviously, competition isn’t ripe right now in the East. But, they’ve benefited greatly from a combination of faster-than-expected player development and the venerable Roberto Luongo in net, who is able to bail the team out of trouble when things get dicey.

 

[Lundell4Prez]

Great article. Go Cats Go

 

[iam76]

i hope to god soon brian campbell starts passing to ekblad especially on the power play... very tired of the weird long campbell slapshot that never goes in.. This isnt last year Brian.. your d partner has a better sneakier shot... and oh btw u will get more assists this way... prolly a 10a to 1g ratio... but no its cool keep shooting brian

grumpy rant over

just something i have noticed.

 

[batting1k]

i hope to god soon brian campbell starts passing to ekblad especially on the power play... very tired of the weird long campbell slapshot that never goes in.. This isnt last year Brian.. your d partner has a better sneakier shot... and oh btw u will get more assists this way... prolly a 10a to 1g ratio... but no its cool keep shooting brian

grumpy rant over

just something i have noticed.

Same with Gudbranson. His shots barely ever hit the net, almost always high or wide. Would rather have a 4th forward on the PP than him.

 

[Erased]

i hope to god soon brian campbell starts passing to ekblad especially on the power play... very tired of the weird long campbell slapshot that never goes in.. This isnt last year Brian.. your d partner has a better sneakier shot... and oh btw u will get more assists this way... prolly a 10a to 1g ratio... but no its cool keep shooting brian

grumpy rant over

just something i have noticed.

It irks me as well that we never try to set him up for the one timer on the pp. It wasn't even until the second pit game that they even tried putting him on the offhand side to give Campbell the option to go for the one timer. It worked wonders for Garrison and Ekblad has an even better shot.

 

[SoupyFIN]

i hope to god soon brian campbell starts passing to ekblad especially on the power play... very tired of the weird long campbell slapshot that never goes in.. This isnt last year Brian.. your d partner has a better sneakier shot... and oh btw u will get more assists this way... prolly a 10a to 1g ratio... but no its cool keep shooting brian

grumpy rant over

just something i have noticed.

Pittsburgh took away Ekblad's shot well in both of the games and Toronto did it too. Doesn't leave much of a choice for them, Campbell has a better chance of scoring a goal when they're not expecting him to shoot it.

It's like when teams figured out Garrison's bomb, it wasn't nearly as effective towards the end of the 11-12 regular season and he only scored one goal (can't recall whether it was on the PP or not) in the four playoff games he played. Teams are starting to figure out that Ekblad is the trigger man on the PP and they're taking it away, and rightfully so.