Florida Panthers

Eliminated. Again!

While it took 81 games to do so, the Florida Panthers have been eliminated from this seasons’ playoffs making it the 8th consecutive year. It has been twelve seasons since their last playoff win and thirteen seasons since their last playoff series win.

As far as I am concerned there is nothing to be happy about, nothing to be grateful for, and most of all I am not going to sit here and say what a bright future this organization has, even though we came close. There are alot of problems and issues here that need to be addressed. I will do so in the next post or two, but for this article I am just going to make some statements about the team that are my observations alone. Chime in as well if you have anything to add.

Stats: Offense 20th 2.8 GPG
Overtime: 27th 7-11
Shoutout: 29th 3-8
Shootout attempts: 30th 6-32
Could Jussi Jokineen have helped?

Little Stevie Weiss team leader in points. 14G 45A 59 points. Terrible for a team leader.
Nathan Horton while only playing 66 games has only 22 goals. Former first round pick, not worth it.
Cory Stillman while a useful supplementary player has 17 goals. This did not replace the 30 that Ollie had traditionally given.

This team needs to make some significant changes.
MUST GET A TOP LINE SNIPER. Each time this player takes a shot, it has a chance to go in.
Change the defensive system and if that means firing Mike Kitchen do it. Can’t continue to give up 35 shots every/most nights.
Work on the powerplay to become more creative. Although that would require players that are actually creative themselves.
Fire the conditioning staff. Mostly because DeBoer rolls 3 lines, they are out of gas by the third period.
Nathan Horton is a bust. He needs a change of scenery.

Please do not resign Jay. Let him walk if he can’t be traded. When the Panthers needed him most at the end, he disappeared. He has no playoff moxy. It’s obvious, he doesn’t want to be here.
Stop promising/relying on the development of our young players to carry the team.

Get some veteran leaders. Say what you want about Keenan, adding Roberts, Joe N, Gelinas, was a great idea. This team currently has no veteran to take that role. We have no captain.

Fire Jacques Martin, or let him explore other opportunities. He has done nothing in 4 years to address the lack of scoring power the team lacks. He has expected way too much from this group of players.
It’s apparent that he actually thought that a strong defense would actually cover up a weak offense.
The GM’s job is to build a roster of players that will realistically get you to the playoffs. His focus has been on defense. Granted he did get Vokoun to ultimately replace Luongo, but if you can’t score I don’t care if we have Martin Brodeur, we aren’t going to be any better.

Ownership needs to hire a President of Operations to actually run things, like Brian Burke in Toronto.
Then Alan Cohen can get the heck out of the way.

I will be attending Saturday’s home game, the season’s last. I am not happy about it, not going to be in a good mood for it and have no desire to hope for a win to end the season on a positive note.
I will be rooting for the Chicago Blackhawks during this years playoffs. The team I grew up loving and miss dearly since I moved to Florida. I am glad they have come back to respectability and are in the playoffs. I hope for a long run, but at least I know their future is bright.

Any comments or additions to this are welcome.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. Olli Jokineen is in the playoffs!