Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
The breaking point
Missing playoffs by a single tick teaches a lesson
SUNRISE — The sting of disappointment hasn’t worn off in the days since the Florida Panthers were eliminated from postseason contention. If anything, their discontent has grown deeper as the NHL playoffs gear up tonight.
The Panthers used a secondhalf surge to finish the season with 96 points, the third-best campaign in franchise history. But they also missed the postseason for the fifth time in the last six seasons, perhaps earning the dubious distinction as one of the best teams to not make the playoffs.
Florida became the second team in league history to miss the playoffs with at least 96 points.
“P—d off,” General Manager Dale Tallon said on the team’s exit day Tuesday. “Not satisfied, but come a long way.”
“This 96 would’ve made the playoffs in a lot of years,” coach Bob Boughner said. “It didn’t happen to be this year, but it’s a good lesson to be learned that we have to be able to control our own destiny and not have to hope for other teams to lose.”
“Close isn’t good enough for us,” forward Nick Bjugstad said. “We’re definitely going to change the way it’s been going.”
The Panthers once sat 12 points out of a playoff spot at the All-Star break, but finished the season 25-8-2. No team in the NHL had more points than Florida’s 52 since the break.
A slow start buried Florida in the standings so far that not even the breakout second half could put them in a playoff position for even a day. The closest the team got was one point back with three games in hand.
The Panthers began the season 4-8-2 and didn’t win three consecutive games until Christmas.
“We had a great second half, last 35 games, but it wasn’t quite good enough,” Tallon said. “We’re not accepting of that.”
With one more point, the Panthers would have made the playoffs. They had more regulation and overtime wins than three Eastern Conference playoff teams, but still found themselves on the outside looking in when the regular season ended Sunday night.
Players, coaches and management started searching for the last point.
Was it lost early on, when the team was still adjusting to Boughner’s style of play? Was it lost during three overtime or shootout losses in December to lotterybound Carolina, Chicago and the New York Islanders? Was it lost in one-goal losses to playoff teams Pittsburgh, San Jose, Nashville and Toronto? Or was it lost in the final month of the season in puzzling losses to bottom-feeders Ottawa and Edmonton?
“You second-guess every game, every night,” Tallon said. “Where’s the one point?”
“You just keep looking back at which games you could have done a better job, play better, make an extra save, get an extra point somewhere,” goaltender Roberto Luongo said. “That’s the type of stuff that goes through your mind right now.”
“The last few nights, you get some restless hours thinking what games you could have won or how it could have been different,” defenseman Keith Yandle said.
Had the Panthers been able to pick up a 97th point, they could have been dangerous in the playoffs. The NHL’s postseason is remarkably unpredictable — Nashville won the Western Conference last season after sneaking into the playoffs — and a Florida team on a tear could have been scary.
Boughner said he texted with other NHL coaches as the season wound down.
“The message that you’re getting from a lot of other teams is, ‘We’re happy we don’t have to see you guys in the first round,’ because they know we’ve been playing top-notch hockey for a long time,” Boughner said.
The Panthers believe they will get off to a better start next season. Boughner describes his system as a detailed one that players struggled to pick up early on — with a different philosophy to push the pace, different breakouts, rotating lines and defensive pairings and different expectations at the blue line. But players said they no longer need to adjust to the scheme.
The franchise will have to wait another year to win its first playoff series since 1996, but the team is entering a different offseason than last year. A year ago, Florida reappointed Tallon general manager and was looking for a new coach after Tom Rowe held both positions. This summer, pieces are expected to remain stable.
“I think they see light at the end of the tunnel, I really do,” Boughner said. “I don’t think they could say the same last year at this time.”