Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
It’s the Panthers’ time
Moribund team finds new life
SUNRISE
— From the day he was drafted, a soft-spoken kid with no driver’s license, he promised to do his best. That’s all he could offer, he said then. And on Wednesday morning, Aleksander Barkov was at it again while talking about playing the best.
“Connor McDavid is one of the best in the league,” the Panthers center said about meeting the Edmonton wunderkind Wednesday night. “It will be a tough game for us.”
Then Barkov, who is better at his job than any other South Florida athlete is at theirs, added something significant in his soft-spoken way, something that shows he knows he’s grown up.
“It’ll be tough for us — and for them,’’ he said.
Barkov then scored a tying goal in the opening seconds of Wednesday’s second period. That continued his streak of six goals and three assists in the eight games since his return from injury.
That, right there, is the short answer to how the Panthers are the latest South Florida team to have their season resuscitated back to life.
The Dolphins started 1-4.
Then came alive.
The Heat started 11-30. Then began their season.
Now it’s happening again, believe it or not. The Panthers played rope-adope with their season, oscillating between inconsistency and injury for so long their coach was fired and their captain embarked on a just-completed fivegame road trip by labeling it, “make or break.”
After five straight wins, the captain, Derek MacKenzie, stood in the home locker room late Wednesday morning. Season made or broken? Did anyone really have to ask?
“That was a slippery slope, where if it went two or three games in the other direction, it really could’ve taken us out of things,’’ MacKenzie said. “Looking at the standings, it’s got us back in the mix. Now we have to keep it up.”
Three times they were down a goal through the first couple of periods Wednesday to Edmonton. Three times they came back to tie it up. That’s the mark of a team that will keep coming at you — and has the firepower to do so.
We can quibble with how they got here or why a great last season stumbled so unfortunately out of the gates. What isn’t up for debate is this is the Panthers time right now.
It’s their stage. It’s their chance. It’s finally their moment to take the next, progressive of the good team from last season into being a contender like their youth and talent merit.
This franchise needs some good bandwagon hopping to become relevant again, too. That’s easy to understand by taking its pulse in a couple of areas.
Television ratings? Panthers games ranked second-to-last among 21 metered U.S. markets with a minuscule .27 rating, according to Street & Smith’s Sports Business Daily. That’s a 35 percent improvement from a year ago (Heat ratings, down 48 percent this year, still attract 10 times the viewers with a 2.3 rating).
Attendance? The Panthers rank 27th in the league at 14,553 fans entering Wednesday’s game. That’s down from 15,384 last year, though a lot of factors can play into that from stopping giveaways to, well, the disappointment of this team — until now.
Win, and South Florida shows up. This team shouldn’t just win. It should take the next progressive step from last year’s breakthrough season. Barkov is the flagship of that youth and bravado.
At the last stop of the recent road trip in St. Louis, coach Mike Yeo became the latest to single him out as, “elite.” Barkov shrugs at that. He mentions the return of linemate Jonathan Huberdeau to health as equal reason for this season’s turn.
“We were a good team before that wasn’t always playing good,’’ he said. “But this road trip we felt even more chemistry, playing for each other more and playing better defensively.”
Give interim coach Tom Rowe credit. The question was how the players would respond to him. For the first couple of months, it wasn’t quite clear. Now that they have their top line intact, it’s easier to see.
“We got a long way to go,’’ Rowe said. “Every one we’re fighting won (Tuesday) night. We can’t let our foot off the gas the rest of the way.”
Twenty-three games to go. Stay tuned.